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.     RIVERSIDE  TEXTBOOKS  IN  EDUCATION 

/  BY  THE  SAME  AUTHOR 


1 


>       A  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

[EDUCATIONAL  PRACTICE  AND  PROGRESS  CONSIDERED  AS  A 

PHASE  OF  THE  DEVELOPMENT  AND  SPREAD 

OF  WESTERN  CIVILIZATION 


J  849  pp..  24  yiiustrations  in  the  text.  )  7  insert  plates.  Or  ^  /U9    A. 

yX>UC>r  >Vl-£^   WaDINGS  in  THlf^*r^^  7^ 

^  #kW  <^.     -'  .    ^^l-mStORY  OF  EDUCATION^    f^         /^ 

■  ■  A  COLLECTION  OF  SOURCES  AND  READINGS  TO 

ILLUSTRATE  THE  DEVELOPMENT  OF  EDUCATIONAL 
PRACTICE,  THEORY,  AND  ORGANIZATION 
A  Companion  Volume  to  the  Present  Volume 
•  684  pp.,  375  Readings,  90  illustrations. 


'^       PUBLIC  EDUCATION  IN  THE 
UNITED  STATES 

A  STUDY  AND  INTERPRETATION  OF  AMERICAN 
EDUCATIONAL  HISTORY 

An  Introductory  Textbook  dealing  with  the  Larger  Problems 

of  Present-Day  Education  in  the  Light  of  their  Historical  Development 

517  pp.,  85  illustrations  in  text,  20  insert  plates. 


PUBLIC  SCHOOL  ADMINISTRATION 

A  STATEMENT  OF  THE  FUNDAMENTAL  PRINCIPLES  UNDERLYING 

THE  ORGANIZATION  AND  ADMINISTRATION  OF 

PUBLIC  EDUCATION 

Revised  Edition,  479  pp.,  37  charts  and  plans. 


RURAL  LIFE  AND  EDUCATION 

A  STUDY  OF  THE  RURAL  SCHOOL  PROBLEM  AS  A  PHASE 
OF  THE  RURAL  LIFE  PROBLEM 

New  Revised  Edition,  377  pp.,  75  illustrations, 
32  insert  plates. 


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A  BRIEF 
HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

A  HISTORY  OF  THE  PRACTICE  AND 

PROGRESS  AND  ORGANIZATION 

OF  EDUCATION 

BY 

ELLWOOD  P.  CUBBERLEY 

PROFESSOR  OF   EDUCATION 
LELAND   STANFORD  JUNIOR   UNIVERSITY 


i      3 

I    i 


HOUGHTON  MIFFLIN  COMPANY 

BOSTON  NEW  YORK  CHICAGO  SAN  FRANCISCO 


S-F) i||ll""l||l""l|||l'"ll|||U"U||||Ml||||||l.l||||| |||IMIII||| |||l Ijl Ijl |||II"II||||I<M|||| |||ll'ltl|||l |||IIIMI|||I |||IMUI||| ||||ll.ll|j|n"ll|j|lln|,7=-e 

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COPYRIGHT,  1922,  BY  ELLWOOD  P.  CUBBERLET 
Copyright,  1920,  by  Ellwood  P.  Cubberley 

ALL  RIGHTS  RESERVED 


CAMBRIDGE  ■  MASSACHUSETTS 
PRINTED  IN  THE  U.S.A. 


Educ.-PsycK.       ^ 
Library 

PREFACE  C^'^Ll 

The  present  volume  is  an  abridgment  and  condensation  of  my 
History  of  Education,  issued  in  1920,  and  lias  been  prepared  to 
meet  the  needs  of  normal  schools  and  colleges  which  desire  to 
teach  the  general  history  of  education,  but  which  do  not  have 
the  time  or  the  inclination  to  go  into  the  subject  in  such  detail 
as  is  given  in  the  larger  volume  above  referred  to.  The  general 
plan  of  the  two  books  is  the  same. 

Like  the  larger  History  of  Education,  the  present  volume  is  a 
history  of  the  practice  and  progress  and  organization  of  educa- 
tion itself,  rather  than  a  history  of  educational  theory,  and  pre- 
sents- the  history  of  education  as  a  phase  of  the  history  of  the  rise 
and  development  and  spread  of  our  Western  civilization.  As  in 
the  larger  volume,  I  have  tried  here  to  present  such  a  picture  of 
the  rise,  struggle  for  existence,  growth,  and  recent  great  expan- 
sion of  the  idea  of  the  improvability  of  the  race  and  the  elevation 
and  emancipation  of  the  individual  through  education  as  would 
be  most  illuminating  and  useful  to  students  of  the  subject.  To 
this  end  I  have  traced  the  great  forward  steps  in  the  emancipation 
of  the  intellect  of  man,  and  the  efforts  to  perpetuate  the  progress 
made  through  the  organization  of  educational  institutions  to 
pass  on  to  others  what  had  been  attained. 

To  this  end  I  have  tried  to  hold  to  the  main  lines  of  the  story, 
and  have  in  consequence  omitted  reference  to  many  theorists 
and  reformers  and  events  and  schools  which  doubtless  were  im- 
portant in  their  land  and  time,  but  the  influence  of  which  on  the 
main  current  of  educational  progress  was,  after  all,  but  small.  For 
such  omission  I  have  no  apology  to  make.  In  their  place  I  have 
introduced  a  record  of  world  events  and  forces,  not  included  in 
the  usual  history  of  education,  which  to  me  seem  important  as 
having  contributed  materially  to  the  shaping  and  directing  of 
intellectual  and  educational  progress.  While  in  the  treatment 
major  emphasis  has  been  given  to  modern  times,  I  have  never- 
theless tried  to  show  how  all  modern  education  has  been  after  all 
a  development,  a  culmination,  a  flowering-out  of  forces  and  im- 
pulses which  go  far  back  in  history  for  their  origin.  In  a  civiliza- 
tion such  as  we  of  to-day  enjoy,  with  roots  so  deeply  embedded  in 

1288938 


vi  PREFACE 

the  past  as  is  ours,  any  adequate  understanding  of  world  prac- 
tices and  of  present-day  world  problems  in  education  calls  for  some 
tracing  of  development  to  give  proper  background  and  persp>ec- 
tive.  The  rise  of  modern  state  schools  systems,  the  variations  in 
types  found  to-day  in  different  lands,  the  new  conceptions  of  the 
educational  purpose,  the  rise  of  science  study,  the  new  functions 
which  the  school  has  recently  assumed,  the  world-wide  sweep  of 
modern  educational  ideas,  the  rise  of  many  entirely  new  types  of 
schools  and  training  within  the  past  century  —  these  and  many 
other  features  of  modern  educational  practice  in  progressive 
nations  are  better  understood  if  viewed  in  the  light  of  their 
proper  historical  setting. 

As  in  the  larger  volume,  chief  dependence  for  supplemental 
reading  has  been  placed  on  the  companion  volume  of  Readings  in 
the  History  of  Education,  and  these  have  been  fully  cross-refer- 
enced to  (R.  125;  R.  216;  etc.)  in  the  pages  of  the  text.  With  a 
number  of  copies  of  the  Readings  available  for  reference  work, 
this  text  could  be  used  without  other  library  equipment.  Depend- 
ing so  largely  on  the  companion  volume  for  the  necessary  supple- 
mental readings,  the  chapter  bibliographies  have  in  consequence 
been  reduced  to  a  very  few  of  the  more  valuable  and  more  com- 
monly found  references.  On  pages  xv  and  xvi  is  also  given  a 
list  of  the  more  important  general  histories  of  education  com- 
monly found  in  normal-school  and  college  Hbraries,  and  to  these 
reference  may  be  made,  as  desired,  for  still  further  supplemental 
reading.  To  add  to  the  teaching  value  of  the  book,  the  same 
series  of  Questions  for  Discussion  based  on  the  text,  appended  to 
each  of  the  chapters  of  the  larger  volume,  has  been  retained  in 
this  briefer  text.  The  teacher  of  this  text  will  find  that  the  pos- 
session of  a  copy  of  the  larger  volume  will  be  very  useful,  by 
reason  of  the  large  amount  of  additional  illustrative  material  it 
will  supply. 

Ellwood  p.  Cubberley 

Stanford  University,  Col. 
June  19, 1922 


CONTENTS 

PART  I 

THE  ANCIENT  WORLD 

FOUNDATION  ELEMENTS  OF  OUR  WESTERN  CIVILIZATION 
GREECE  —  ROME  —  CHRISTIANITY 

Chapter  I.  The  Old  Greek  Education 

I.  Greece  and  its  People 5 

11.  Early  Education  in  Greece 7 

Chapter  II.  Later  Greek  Education 

III.  The  New  Greek  Education 19 

Chapter  III.  The  Education  and  Work  of  Rome 

I.  The  Romans  and  their  Mission 28 

II.  The  Period  of  Home  Education  ......  30 

III.  The  Transition  TO  School  Education       ....  31 

IV.  The  School  System  as  finally  established     •       .       .  33 
V.  Rome's  Contribution  to  Civilization       ....  38 

Chapter  IV.  The  Rise  and  Contribution  of  Chris- 
tianity 

I.  The  Rise  and  Victory  of  Christianity     ....  44 
II.  Educational  and  Governmental  Organization  of  the 

Early  Church 50 

III.  What  the  Middle  Ages  started  with      ....  55 

PART  II 

THE  MEDIEVAL  WORLD 

THE  DELUGE  OF  BARBARISM;  THE  MEDIEVAL  STRUGGLE 
TO  PRESERVE  AND  REESTABLISH  CIVILIZATION 

Chapter  V.  New  Peoples  in  the  Empire 63 

Chapter  VI.  Education  during  the  Early  Middle  Ages 

I.  Condition  and  Preservation  of  Learning       .       .  1^ 

Chapter  VII.  Education    during   the    Early    Middle 
Ages 

II.  Schools  established  and  Instruction  provided     .       .     83 


viii  CONTENTS 

Chapter  VIII.  Influences  tending  toward  a  Revival 
OF  Learning 

I.  Moslem  Learning  from  Spain 
II.  The  Rise  of  Scholastic  Theology 

III.  Law  and  Medicine  as  New  Studies    . 

IV.  Other  New  Influences  and  Movements  . 

Chapter  IX.  The  Rise  of  the  Universities 


96 
99 

lOI 

104 
113 


PART  III 

THE  TRANSITION  FROM  MEDIEVAL  TO 
-MODERN  ATTITUDES 

THE   RECOVERY   OF  THE   ANCIENT   LEARNING;   THE 

REAWAKENING  OF  SCHOLARSHIP;  AND  THE  RISE 

OF  RELIGIOUS  AND  SCIENTIFIC  INQUIRY 

Chapter  X.  The  Revival  of  Learning 129 

Chapter  XI.  Educational  Results  of  the  Revival  of 

Learning 142 

Chapter  XII.  The  Revolt  against  Authority   .      .      .  153 

Chapter  XIII.  Educational  Results  of  the  Protestant 
Revolts 

I.  Among  Lutherans  AND  Anglicans 164 

Chapter  XIV.  Educational  Results  of  the  Protestant 
Revolts 

II.  Among  Calvinists  AND  Catholics 175 

Chapter  XV.  Educational  Results  of  the  Protestant 

Revolts  '  ^-^ 

III.  The  Reformation  and  American  Education   .       .       '(^^9^ 
Chapter  XVI.  The  Rise  OF  Scientific  Inquiry   .      .      .205 

Chapter  XVII.  The  New  Scientific  Method  and  the 
Schools 

I.  Humanistic  Realism 213 

II.  Social  Realism 216 

III.  Sense  Realism '    .       .  218 

IV.  Realism  and  the  Schools 225 

Chapter  XVIII.  Theory  and  Practice  by  the  Middle 
OF  the  Eighteenth  Century 
I.  Pre-Eighteenth-Century  Educational  Theories  .       .  229 
II.  Mid-Eighteenth-Century  Educational  Conditions      .  232 


CONTENTS  ix 

PART  IV 

MODERN  TIMES 

THE  ABOLITION  OF  PRIVILEGE;  THE  RISE  OF  DEMOCRACY; 

A  NEW  THEORY  FOR  EDUCATION   EVOLVED: 

THE  STATE  TAKES  OVER  THE  SCHOOL 

Chapter  XIX.  The  Eighteenth  a  Transition  Century 

I.  Work  of  the  Benevolent  Despots  of  Continental 

Europe 254 

II.  The  Unsatisfied  Demand  for  Reform  in  France  .       .  259 

III.  England  the  First  Democratic  Nation    .  .       .261 

IV.  Institution  of  Constitutional  Government  and  Re- 

ligious Freedom  in  America 267 

V.  The  French  Revolution  sweeps  away  Ancient  Abuses  270 

Chapter  XX.  The  Beginnings  of  National  Education 

I.  New  Conceptions  of  the  Educational  Purpose     .       .  275 

II.  The  New  State  Theory  in  France 276 

III.  The  New  State  Theory  in  America   ....       -(^84^ 


Chapter  XXI.  A  New  Theory  and  Subject-Matter  for 
THE  Elementary  School 

I.  The  New  Theory  stated 291 

II.  German  Attempts  to  work  out  a  New  Theory     .       .  294 

III.  The  Work  and  Influence  of  Pestalozzi  ....  297 

IV.  Redirection  of  the  Elementary  School  ....  303 

Chapter  XXII.  National  Organization  in  Prussia. 

I.  The  Beginnings  of  National  Organization    .       .       .  308 
II.  A  State  School  System  at  last  created  .       .       .314 

Chapter  XXIII.  National  Organization  in  France       .  324 

Chapter  XXIV.  The  Struggle  for  National  Organiza- 
tion in  England 

I.  The  Charitable -Voluntary  Beginnings  ....  335 

II.  The  Period  of  Philanthropic  Effort       ....  338 

III.  The  Struggle  for  National  Education    ....  344 

Chapter  XXV.  Awakening  an  Educational  Conscious- 
ness IN  THE  United  States 

I.  Early  National  Attitudes  and  Interests       .  .  .  353 

II.  Awakening  an  Educational  Consciousness     .  .  .  357 

III.  Social,  Political,  and  Economic  Influences  .  .  .  363 

IV.  Alignment  of  Interests,  and  Propaganda       .  .  .  367 


X  CONTENTS 

Chapter  XXVI.  The  American  Battle  for  Free  State 
Schools 

I.  The  Battle  for  Tax  Support 370 

II.  The  Battle  to  Eliminate  the  Pauper- School  Idea       .  373 

III.  The  Battle  to  make  the  Schools  entirely  Free  .       .  376 

IV.  The  Battle  to  establish  School  Supervision         .       .  378 
V.  The  Battle  to  Eliminate  Sectarianism    .       .       .       .381 

VI.  The  Battle  to  Establish  the  American  High  School  .  384 
VII.  The  State  University  crowns  the  System       .       .       .  388 

Chapter  XXVII.  Education  becomes  a  National  Tool 

I.  Spread  of  the  State-Control  Idea 395 

II.  New  Modifying  Forces  .      .       .       .       .       .       .       .  404 

III.  Effect  of  These  Changes  on  Education  ....  408 

Chapter  XXVIII.  New  Conceptions  of  the  Educational 
Process 

I.  The  Psychological  Organization  of  Elementary  In- 
struction  413 

II.  New  Ideas  from  Herbartian  Sources       ....  419 

III.  The  Kindergarten,  Play,  and  Manual  Activities        .  424 

IV.  The  Addition  of  Science  Study  430 

V.  Social  Meaning  of  these  Changes 434 

Chapter  XXIX.  New  Tendencies  and  Expansions 

I.  Political  440 

II.  Sociological 446 

Conclusion;  The  Future 456 

Index i 


LIST  OF  FIGURES 

1.  Ancient  Greece  and  the  ^Egean  World 4 

2.  A  Greek  Boy 9 

3.  An  Athenian  Inscription n 

4.  Greek  Writing-Materials 11 

5.  A  Greek  Counting-Board 11 

6.  Socrates 22 

7.  The  Early  Peoples  of  Italy,  and  the  Extension  of  the 

Roman  Power 28 

8.  The  Principal  Roman  Roads 29 

9.  Roman  Writing-Materials 33 

10.  A  Roman  Counting- Board ,      .      .34 

11.  The  Roman  Voluntary  Educational  System,  as  finally 

evolved 37 

12.  A  Bishop 52 

13.  A  German  War  Chief 64 

14.  Romans  destroying  a  German  Village 65 

15.  A  Typical  Monastery  of  Southern  Europe       ....  73 

16.  Charlemagne's  Empire,  and  the  Important  Monasteries  of 

the  Time 75 

17.  Where  the  Danes  ravaged  England 80 

18.  An  Outer  Monastic  School 83 

19.  A  Squire  being  knighted 89 

30.  A  Knight  of  the  Time  of  the  First  Crusade     ....  90 

21.  Showing  Centers  OF  Moslem  Learning 97 

22.  Showing  Location  of  the  Chief  Universities  founded  be- 

fore 1600 114 

23.  New  College,  AT  Oxford 117 

24.  Library  of  the  University  of  Leyden,  in  Holland  .      .      .119 

25.  A  University  Lecture  and  Lecture  Room 121 

26.  Petrarch 131 

27.  Boccaccio 132 

28.  Bookcase  and  Desk  in  the  Medicean  Library  at  Florence  135 

29.  An  Early  Sixteenth-Century  Press 136 

30.  The  World  as  known  to  Christian  Europe  before  Colum- 

bus        137 

31.  College  de  France 145 

32.  JoHANN  Sturm 146 

33.  Showing  the  Results  of  the  Protestant  Revolts  .      .      .157 

34.  huldreich  zwingli i58 

35.  John  Calvin 159 

36.  Evolution  of  German  State  School  Control    ....  i6q 


xii  LIST  OF  FIGURES 

37.  A  Dutch  Village  School 177 

38.  Ignatius  de  Loyola 179 

39.  Tendencies  in  Educational  Development  in  Europe,  1500 

TO  1700 186 

40.  Map  showing  the  Religious  Settlements  in  America   .      .190 

41.  Homes  of  the  Pilgrims,  and  their  Route  to  America  .      .  192 

42.  Where  Yale  College  was  founded 196 

43.  An  Old  Quaker  Meeting-House  and  School  at  Lampeter, 

Pennsylvania 199 

44.  The  Loss  and  Recovery  of  the  Sciences 211 

45.  Francois  Rabelais 214 

46.  John  Milton 215 

47.  Michel  de  Montaigne 216 

48.  John  Locke 217 

49.  A  Horn  Book 234 

50.  The  Westminster  Catechism 236 

51.  Frontispiece    to  Noah    Webster's    "American    Spelling 

Book" 237 

52.  A  "Christian  Brothers"  School 239 

53.  A  Charity-School  Girl  in  Uniform 241 

54.  A  Charity-School  Boy  in  Uniform 241 

55.  Advertisement  for  a  Teacher  to  let 242 

56.  A  School  Whipping-Post 244 

57.  An  Eighteenth-Century  German  School 244 

58.  A  Pennsylvania  Academy 248 

59.  Rousseau 276 

60.  La  Chalotais       .      .      .      .     " 277 

61.  Rolland 277 

62.  Diderot 278 

63.  Count  de  Mirabeau 279 

64.  Talleyrand 280 

65.  Condorcet 281 

66.  The  Institute  of  France 281 

67.  Lakanal 283 

68.  Thomas  Jefferson 287 

69.  The  Rousseau  Monument  at  Geneva 292 

70.  Basedow 294 

71.  The  Scene  of  Pestalozzi's  Labors 298 

72.  Fellenberg 303 

73.  The  School  of  a  Handworker 310 

74.  Dinter 316 

75.  DiESTERWEG 316 

76.  The  Prussian  State  School  System  created      .      .      .      .321 

77.  Victor  Cousin 330 

78.  Outline  of  the  Main   Features  of  the  French  State 

School  System 331 


LIST  OF  FIGURES  xiii 

79.  A  Ragged-School  Pupil 338 

80.  The  Creators  of  the  Monitorial  System 339 

81.  The  Lancastrian  Model  School  in  Borough  Road,  South- 

WARK,  London 340 

82.  Monitors  teaching  Reading  AT  "Stations"       ....  341 

83.  Robert  Owen 343 

84.  Lord  Brougham 345 

85.  Lord  Macaulay 347 

86.  The  English  Educational  System  as  finally  evolved  .      .  349 

87.  "Model"  School  Building  of  the  Public  School  Society  .  361 

88.  Evolution  of  the  Essential  Features  of  the  American 

Public  School  System 362 

89.  Dates  of  the  Granting  of  Full  Manhood  Suffrage     .      .  365 

90.  The  First  Free  Public  School  in  Detroit         ....  372 

91.  The  Development  of  Secondary  Schools  in  the  United 

States 386 

.  92.  The  First  High  School  in  the  United  States    ....  387 

93.  The  American  Educational  Ladder 392 

94.  The  Progress  of  Literacy  in  Europe  by  the  Close  of  the 

Nineteenth  Century         397 

95.  The  Japanese  Two-Class  School  System 401 

96.  The  Chinese  Educational  Ladder   .      . 402 

97.  Man  Power  before  the  Days  of  Steam 407 

98.  The  First  Modern  Normal  School 416 

99.  Herbert  Spencer 432 

100.  The  Reverend  Thomas  H.  Gallaudet  teaching  the  Deaf 

AND  Dumb         450 

loi.  The  Educational  Problems  of  the  Future       ....  457 


LIST  OF  PLATES 

FACING 

1.  Saint  Thomas  Aquinas  in  the  School  of  Albertus  Magnus  .    86 

2.  Stratford-on-Avon  Grammar  School 170 

3.  John  Amos  Comenius 222 

4.  Pestalozzi  Monument  at  Yverdon 300 

5.  Two  Leaders  in  the  Educational  Awakening  in  the  United 

States 378 

6.  Two  Leaders  in  the  Reorganization  of  Educational  Theory  424 


GENERAL  BIBLIOGRAPHY 

In  addition  to  the  List  of  Readings  and  the  Supplemental  Ref- 
erences given  in  the  chapter  bibliographies,  the  following  works, 
not  cited  in  the  chapter  bibliographies,  will  be  found  in  most 
libraries  and  may  be  consulted,  on  all  points  to  which  they  are 
likely  to  apply,  for  additional  material: 

I.  GENERAL  HISTORIES  OF  EDUCATION 

I.  Davidson,  Thomas.     History  of  Education.      292  pp.    New  York, 
1900. 
Good  on  the  interpretation  of  the  larger  movements  of  history. 

*2.  Monroe,  Paul.    Text  Book  in  the  History  of  Education.     772  pp.    New 
York,  1905. 

Our  most  complete  and  scholarly  history  of  educational  theory.  This 
volume  should  be  consulted  freely.     See  analytical  table  of  contents. 

3.  Munroe,  Jas.  P.     The  Educational  Ideal.   262  pp.    Boston,  1895. 
Contains  very  good  short  chapters  on  the  educational  reformers. 

*4.  Graves,  F.  P.    A  History  of  Education.     3  vols.    New  York,  1909-13. 
Vol.    I.  Before  the  Middle  Ages.    304  pp. 
Vol.  n.  During  the  Middle  Ages.    314  pp. 
Vol.  HI.  In  Modern  Times.    410  pp. 

These  volumes  contain  valuable  supplementary  material,  and  good  chap- 
ter bibliographies. 

5.  Hart,  J.  K.    Democracy  in  Education.    418  pp.    New  York,  1918. 

An  interpretation  of  educational  progress. 

6.  Quick,  R.  H.     Essays  on  Educational  Reformers.     568  pp.    2d  ed., 
New  York,  1890. 

A  series  of  well-written  essays  on  the  work  of  the  theorists  in  education 
since  the  time  of  the  Renaissance. 

*7.  Parker,  S.  C.     The  History  of  Modern  Elementary  Education.    506  pp. 
Boston,  191 2. 

An  excellent  treatise  on  the  development  of  the  theory  for  our  modem 
elementary  school,  with  some  good  descriptions  of  modem  practice. 

n.  GENERAL  BIBLIOGRAPHIES  OF  EDUCATION 

I.  Cubberley,  E.  P.     Syllabus  of  Lectures  on  the  History  of  Education. 
358  pp.     New  York.     First  ed.,  1902;  2d  ed.,  1905. 

Gives  detailed  and  classified  bibliographies  for  all  phases  of  the  subject. 
Now  out  of  print,  but  may  be  found  in  most  normal  school  and  college 
libraries,  and  many  public  libraries.  " 


xvi  GENERAL  BIBLIOGRAPHY 


III.  CYCLOPEDIAS 

*i.  Monroe,  Paul,  Editor.  Cyclopedia  of  Education.  5  vols.  New  York, 
1911-13. 

The  most  important  Cyclopaedia  of  Education  in  print.  Contains  ex- 
cellent articles  on  all  historical  points  and  events,  with  good  selected  bib- 
liographies. A  work  that  should  be  in  all  libraries,  and  freely  consulted 
in  using  this  Text.  Its  historical  articles  are  too  numerous  to  cite  in  the 
chapter  bibliographies,  but,  due  to  the  alphabetical  arrangement  and  good 
cross-referencing,  they  may  be  found  easily. 

*2.  Watson,  Foster,  Editor.  The  Encyclopedia  and  Dictionary  of  Educa- 
tion.   4  voL.   London  and  New  York,  1921-22. 

The  most  recent  Cyclopedia  of  Education,  presenting  recent  contribu- 
tions and  changes,  and  outlining  the  educational  systems  of  most  world 
nations. 

*2,.  Encyclopcedia  Britannica.     nth  ed.,  29  vols.     Cambridge,  19 lo-ii. 
Contains  numerous  important  articles  on  all  types  of  historical  topics, 
and  excellent  biographical  sketches.    Should  be  consulted  freely  in  using  this 
Text. 

IV.  MAGAZINES 

*  I .  Barnard's  A  tnerican  Journal  of  Education.  Edited  by  Henry  Barnard. 
31  vols.  Hartford,  1855-81.  Reprinted,  Syracuse,  1902.  Index 
to  the  31  vols,  published  by  the  United  States  Bureau  of  Education, 
Washington,  1892. 

A  wonderful  mine  of  all  kinds  of  historical  and  educational  information, 
and  should  be  consulted  freely  on  all  points  relating  to  European  or  American 
educational  history. 

In  the  chapter  bibliographies,  as  above,  the  most  important 
references  are  indicated  with  an  asterisk  (*). 


A   BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

• 

PART  I 
THE  ANCIENT  WORLD 

THE  FOUNDATION  ELEMENTS  OF  OUR 

WESTERN  CIVILIZATION 

GREECE  —  ROME  —  CHRISTIANITY 


/-  ^  t^  w 


A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

CHAPTER  I 

THE  OLD  GREEK  EDUCATION 

Introduction.  The  Civilization  which  we  of  to-day  enjoy  is  a 
very  complex  thing,  made  up  of  many  different  contributions, 
some  large  and  some  small,  from  people  in  many  different  lands 
and  different  ages.  To  trace  all  these  contributions  back  to  their 
sources  would  be  a  task  impossible  of  accomplishment,  and,  while 
specific  parts  would  be  interesting,  for  our  purposes  they  would 
not  be  important.  Especially  would  it  not  be  profitable  for  us  to 
attempt  to  trace  the  development  of  minor  features,  or  to  go  back 
to  the  rudimentary  civilizations  of  primitive  peoples.  The  early 
development  of  civilization  among  the  Chinese,  the  Hindoos,  the 
Persians,  the  Egjrptians,  or  the  American  Indians  all  alike  present 
features  which  to  some  form  a  very  interesting  study,  but  our 

Western  civilization  does  not  go  back  to  these  as  sources,  and 
consequently  they  need  not  concern  us  in  the  study  we  are  about 
to  begin. 
The  civilization  which  we  now  know  and  enjoy  has  come  down 

Vto  us  from  four  main  sources.  The  Greeks,  the  Romans,  and  the 
Christians  laid  the  foundations,  and  in  the  order  named,  and  the 
study  of  the  early  history  of  our  western  civilization  is  a  study 
of  the  work  and  the  blending  of  these  three  main  forces.  It  is 
upon  these  three  foundation  stones,  superimposed  upon  one  an- 
other, that  our  modem  European  and  American  civilization  has 
been  developed.  The  Germanic  tribes,  overrunning  the  bound- 
aries of  the  Roman  Empire  in  the  fourth  and  fifth  centuries, 
added  another  new  force  of  largest  future  significance,  and  one 
which  profoundly  modified  all  subsequent  progress  and  develop- 
ment. To  these  four  main  sources  we  have  made  many  additions 
in  modern  times,  building  an  entirely  new  superstructure  on  the 
old  foundations,  but  the  groundwork  of  our  civilization  is  com- 
posed of  these  four  foundation  elements.  For  these  reasons  a 
history  of  even  modem  education  almost  of  necessity  goes  back, 


A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


briefly  at  least,  to  the  work  and  contributions  of  these  andent 
peoples. 

Starting,  then,  with  the  work  of  the  Greeks,  we  shall  state 
briefly  the  contributions  to  the  stream  of  civilization  which  have 
come  down  to  us  from  each  of  the  important  historic  peoples  or 
groups  or  forces,  and  shall  trace  the  blending  and  assimilating 


Fig.  I.  Ancient  Greece  and  the  .^gean  World 

Superimposed  on  the  East-North-Central  Group  of  American  States,  to  show  rela- 
tive size.  Dotted  lines  indicate  the  boundaries  of  the  American  States  —  Illinois, 
Indiana,  Kentucky,  etc.  All  of  Greece  will  be  seen  to  be  a  little  less  than  half  the 
size  of  the  State  of  Illinois,  the  y^gean  Sea  about  the  size  of  the  State  of  Indiana, 
and  Attica  not  quite  so  large  as  two  average-size  Illinois  counties. 

processes  of  the  centuries.  While  describing  briefly  the  educa- 
tional institutions  and  ideas  of  the  different  peoples,  we  shall  be 
far  less  concerned,  as  we  progress  down  the  centuries,  with  the 
educational  and  philosophical  theories  advanced  by  thinkers 
among  them  than  with  what  was  actually  done,  and  with  the  last- 
ing contributions  which  they  made  to  our  educational  practices 
and  to  our  present-day  civilization. 


THE  OLD  GREEK  EDUCATION  5 

I.  GREECE  AND  ITS  PEOPLE 

The  land.  Ancient  Greece,  or  Hellas  as  the  Greeks  called  their 
homeland,  was  but  a  small  country.  The  map  just  given  shows 
the  JEgesin  world  superimposed  on  the  States  of  the  old  North- 
west Territory,  from  which  it  may  be  seen  that  the  Greek  main- 
land was  a  little  less  than  half  as  large  as  the  State  of  Illinois. 
Attica,  where  a  most  wonderful  intellectual  life  arose  and  flour- 
ished for  centuries,  and  whose  contributions  to  civilization  were 
the  chief  glory  of  Greece,  was  smaller  than  two  average-size 
Illinois  counties,  and  about  two  thirds  the  size  of  the  little  State 
of  Rhode  Island.  The  country  was  sparsely  populated,  except  in 
a  few  of  the  City-States,  and  probably  did  not,  at  its  most  pros- 
perous period,  contain  much  more  than  a  million  and  a  half  of 
people  —  citizens,  foreigners,  and  slaves  included. 

The  government.  Politically,  Greece  was  composed  of  a  num- 
ber of  independent  City-States  of  small  size.  They  had  been  set- 
tled by  early  tribes,  which  originally  held  the  land  in  common. 
Attica^  with  its  approximately  seven  hundred  square  miles  of 
territory,  was  an  average-size  City-^itate.  The  central  city,  the 
surrounding  farming  and  grazing  lands,  and  the  coastal  regions 
all  taken  together,  formed  the  State,  the  citizens  of  which  —  city- 
residents,  farmers,  herdsmen,  and  fishermen  —  controlled  the 
government.  There  were  in  all  some  twenty  of  these  City-States 
in  mainland  Greece,  the  most  importanr~of  which  were  Attica, 
of  which  Athens  was  the  central  city;  Laconia,  of  which  Sparta 
was  the  central  city;  and  Boeotia,  of  which  Thebes  was  the  central 
city.  Some  of  the  States  developed  democracies,  of  which  class 
Ajbhens  became  the  most  notable  example,  while  some  were  gov- 
erned as  oligarchies.  Of  all  the  different  States  but  few  played 
any  conspicuous  part  in  the  history  of  Greece.  Of  these  few 
Attica  stands  clearly  above  them  all  as  the  leader  in  thought  and 
art  and  the  most  progressive  in  government.  Here,  truly,  was  a 
most  wonderful  people,  and  it  is  with  Attica  that  the  student  of 
the  history  of  education  is  most  concerned.  The  best  of  all 
Greece  was  there. 

The  people.  The  Greeks  were  among  the  first  of  the  Euro- 
pean peoples  to  attain  to  any  high  degree  of  civilization.  Their 
story  nms  back  almost  to  the  dawn  of  recorded  history.  As 
early  as  3500  B.C.  they  were  in  an  advanced  stone  age,  and  by 
2500  B.C.  had  reached  the  age  of  bronze.     The  destruction  of 


6  A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

Homer's  Troy  dates  back  to  1200  B.C.,  and  the  Homeric  poems 
to  1 100  B.C. 

The  lower  part  of  the  Greek  peninsula,  known  as  Laconia,  was 
settled  by  the  Dorian  branch  of  the  Greek  family,  a  practical, 
forceful,  but  a  wholly  unimaginative  people.  Sparta  was  their 
most  important  city.  To  the  north  were  the  Ionic  Greeks,  a 
many-sided  and  a  highly  imaginative  people.  Athens  was  their 
chief  city.  In  the  settlement  of  Laconia  the  fepartans  imposed 
themselves  as  an  army  of  occupation  on  the  original  inhabitants, 
whom  they  compelled  to  pay  tribute  to  them,  and  established  a 
military  monarchy  in  southen!  Greece.  The  people  of  Attica,  on 
the  other  hand,  absorbed  into  their  own  body  the  few  earlier  set- 
tlers of  the  Attic  plain.  They  also  established  a^onarch^  but, 
being  a  people  more  capable  of  progress,  this  later  evolved  into  a 
^democracy/  The  people  of  Attica  were  in  consequence  a  some- 
what mixed  race,  which  possibly  in  part  accounts  for  their  greater 
intellectual  ability  and  versatility. 

Classes  in  the  population.  Greece,  as  was  the  ancient  world  in 
general,  was  built  poHtically^on  the  dominant  power  of  a  ruUng 
class.  In  consequence,  all  of  course  could  not  become  citizens 
of  the  State,  even  after  a  democracy  had  been  evolved.  Citizen- 
ship came  with  birth  and  proper  education,  and,  before  509  B.C., 
(foreigners  were  seldom  admitted  to  privileges  in  the  State-A  Only 
a  male  citizen  might  hold  office,  protect  himself  in  the  courts,  own 
land,  or  attend  the  public  assemblies.  (  Only  a  citizen,  too,  could 
participate  in  the  religious  festivals  and  rites,  for  rehgion  was  an 
afifair  of  the  ruling  families  of  the  State. 

Even  more,  citizenship  everywhere  in  the  earlier  period  was  a 
degree  to  be  attained  to  only  after  proper  education  and  prelim- 
inary military  and  political  training.  )  This  not  only  made  some 
form  of  education  necessary,  but  confined  educational  advantages 
to  male  youths  of  proper  birth. '  There  was  of  course  no  purpose 
in  educating  any  others.  '  Education  in  Greece  was  essentially 
the  education  of  the  children  of  the  ruling  class  to  perpetuate  the 
rule  of  that  class.  ' 

C  Beneath  both  citizens  and  foreign  residents  was  a  great  founda- 
tion mass  of  working  slaves,  who  rendered  all  types  of  menial  and 
intellectual  services.!  Sailors,  household  servants,  field  workers, 
clerks  in  shops  and  offices,  accountants,  and  pedagogues  were 
among  the  more  common  occupations  of  slaves  in  Greece.  Many 
of  these  had  been  citizens  and  learned  men  of  other  City-States 


THE  OLD  GREEK  EDUCATION  7 

or  countries,  but  had  been  carried  off  as  captives  in  some  war. 
This  was  a  common  practice  in  the  ancient  worid(_slavery  being 
the  lot  of  alien  conquered  people  almost  without  exception,^ 

Education,  then,  being  only  for  the  male  children  of  citizens, 
and  citizenship  a  degree  to  be  attained  to^n  the  basis  of  education 
and  training)  let  us  next  see  in  what  that  education  consisted,  and 
what  wereTts  most  prominent  characteristics  and  results. 

II.  EARLY  EDUCATION  IN  GREECE 

V^Some  form  of  education  that  would  train  the  son  of  the  citizen 
for  participation  in  the  religious  observances  and  duties  of  a  citi- 
zen of  the  State,  and  would  prepare  the  State  for  defense  against 
outward  enemies,  was  everywhere  in  Greece  recognized  as(a  public 
necessity,  though  its  provision,  nature,  and  extent  varied  in  the 
',  ^^differenf  City-States^     We  have  clear  information  only  as  to 
'  l^Sparta  and  Athens,  and  will  consider  only  these  two  as  types. 
<^    Sparta  is  interesting  as  representing  the  old  Greek  tribal  training, 
^  Cfrom  which  Sparta  never  progressed.     Many  of  the  other  Greek 
•^    City-States  probably  maintained  a  system  of  training  much  hke 
,     that  of  Sparta.     Such  educational  systems  stand  as  undesirable  v._ 
;     examples  of  extreme  state  socialism,  contributed  little  to  our 
.'     western  civilization,  and  need  not  detain  us  long.   It  was  Athens,     , 
^     and  a  few  other  City-States  which  followed  her  example,  which'^^ 
1^    presented  the  best  of  Greece  and  passed  on  to  the  modem  world 
^^  what  was  most  valuable  for  civilization. 

<-/ 
I.  Education  in  Sparta     .^y^  , 

The  people.  The  system  of  training  which  was  maintained  in 
^  Sparta  was  in  part  a  reflection  of  the  character  of  the  people,  and 
in  part  a  result  of  its  geographical  location.  A  warlike  people  by 
nature,  the  Spartans  were  for  long  regarded^as  the  ablest  fighters 
in  Greece.  Laconia,  their  home,  was  a  plain  surrounded  by 
moimtains.  They  represented  but  a  small  percentage  of  the  total 
population, (which  they  held  in  subjection  to  them  by  their  mili- 
tary power.'  The  slaves  (Helots)  were  often  troublesome,  and 
were  held  in  check  by  many  kinds  of  questionable  practices. 
[Education  for  citizenship  with  the  Spartans  meant  education  for 
usefulness  in  an  intensely  miUtary  State,  where  preparedness  was 
a  prerequisite  to  safety'^  Strength,  courage,  endurance,  cunning, 
patriotism,  and  obedience  were  the  virtues  most  highly  prized, 
while  the  humane,  literary,  and  artistic  sentiments  were  neg- 
lected (R.  i).\ 


8  A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

The  educational  system.  At  birth  the  child  was  examined  by 
a  council  of  elders  (R.  i),  and  if  it  did  not  appear  to  be  a  promising 
child  it  was  exposed  to  die  in  the  mountains.  If  kept,  the  mother 
had  charge  of  the  child  until  seven  if  a  boy,  and  still  longer  if  a 
girl.  At  the  beginning  of  the  eighth  year,  and  until  the  boy 
reached  the  age  of  eighteen,  he  lived  in  a  public  barrack,  where  he 
was  given  little  except  physical  drill  and  instruction  in  the  Spar- 
tan virtues.  His  food  and  clothing  were  scant  and  his  bed  hard. 
Each  older  man  was  a  teacher.  Running,  leaping,  boxing,  wres- 
tling, military  music,  military  drill,  ball-playing,  the  use  of  the 
spear,  fighting,  stealing,  and  laconic  speech  and  demeanor  con- 
stituted the  course  of  study.  From  eighteen  to  twenty  was  spent 
in  professional  training  for  war,  and  frequently  the  youth  was 
publicly  whipped  to  develop  his  courage  and  endurance.  For  the 
next  ten  years  —  that  is,  until  he  was  thirty  years  old  —  he  was 
in  the  army  at  some  frontier  post.  At  thirty  the  young  man  was 
admitted  to  full  citizenship  and  compelled  £o  marry,  though  con- 
tinuing to  live  at  the  public  barrack  and  spending  his  energies  in 
training  boys  (R.  i).  Women  and  girls  were  given  gymnastic 
training  to  make  them  strong  and  capable  of  bearing  strong  chil- 
dren. The  family  was  virtually  suppressed  in  the  interests  of 
defenses  and  war.  The  intellectual  training  consisted  chiefly  in 
committing  to  memory  the  Laws  of  Lycurgus,  learning  a  few 
selections  from  Homer,  and  listening  to  the  conversation  of  the 
older  men. 

As  might  naturally  be  supposed,  Sparta  contributed  little  of 
anything  to  art,  literature,  science,  philosophy,  or  government. 
She  left  to  the  world  some  splendid  examples  of  heroism,  as  for 
example  the  sacrifice  of  Leonidas  and  his  Spartans  to  hold  the  pass 
at  Thermopylae,  and  a  warning  example  of  the  brutalizing  effect 
on  a  people  of  excessive  devotion  to  military  training.  It  is  a 
pleasure  to  turn  from  this  dark  picture  to  the  wonderful  (for  the 
time)  educational  system  that  was  gradually  developed  at  Athens. 

2.   The  old  Athenian  education 

Schools  and  teachers.  Athenian  education  divides  itself  nat- 
'  urally  into  two  divisions  —  the  old  Athenian  training  which  pre- 
vailed up  to  about  the  time  of  the  close  of  the  Persian  Wars 
(479  B.C.)  and  was(an  outgrowth  of  earlier  tribal  observances  and 
practices,  and  later  Athenian  education,  which  characterized  the 
(  period  of  maximum  greatness  of  Athens  and  afterward.  We  shall 
describe  these  briefly,  in  order. 


THE  OLD  GREEK  EDUCATION 


The  state  military  socialism  of  Sparta  made  no  headway  in 
more  democratic  Attica.  ;  The  citizens  were  too  individualistic, 
and  did  their  own  thinking  too  well  to  permit  the  establishment 
of  any  such  plan.  While  education  was  a  necessity  for  citizen- 
ship, and  the  degree  could  not  be  obtained  without  it,  the  State 
nevertheless  left  every  citizen  free  to  make  his  own  arrangements 
for  the  education  of  his  sons,  or  to  omit 
such  education  if  he  saw  lit.^  Only  instruc- 
tion in  reading,  writing,  music,  and  gym- 
nastics were  required.  If  family  pride,  and 
the  sense  of  obligation  of  a  parent  and  a 
citizen  were  not  sufficient  to  force  the  father 
to  educate  his  son,  the  son  was  then  by  law 
freed  from  the  necessity  of  supporting  his 
father  in  his  old  age.  The  State  supervised 
education,  but  did  not  establish  it. 
\  The  teachers  were  private  teachers,  and 
derived  their  livelihood  from  fees.)  These 
naturally  varied  much  with  the  kind  of 
teacher  and  the  wealth  of  the  parent,  much 
as  private  lessons  in  music  or  dancing  do 
to-day.  As  was  common  in  antiquity, 
the  teachers  occupied  but  a  low  social 
position  (R.  5),  and  only  in  the  higher 
schools  of  Athens  was  their  standing  of  any  importance.  Greek 
literature  contains  many  passages  which  show  the  low  social 
status  of  the  schoolmaster.^  'Schools  were  open  from  dawn  to 
dark.  The  school  discipline  was  severe,  the  rod  being  freely  used 
both  in  the  school  and  in  the  home.  There  were  no  Saturday 
and  Sunday  holidays  or  long  vacations,  such  as  we  know,  but 
(about  ninety  festival  land  other  state  hoh'days  served  to  break  the 
continuity  of  instruction  (R.  3).  The  schoolrooms  were  provided 
by  the  teachers,  and  were  wholly  lacking  in  teaching  equipment, 
in  any  modern  sense  of  the  term.  However,  but  little  was  needed. 
(^The  instruction  was  largely  individual  instruction,  the  boy  com- 
ing, usually  in  charge  of  an  old  slave  known  as  a  pedagogue,  to  re- 
ceive or  recite  his  lessons. ,'  ^he  teaching  process  was  essentially 
a  telling  and  a  leaming-by-heart  procedure. 
(  For  the  earlier  years  there  were  two  schools  which  boys  at- 
tended—  the  music  and  literary  school,  and  a  school  for  physical 
training,   ,  Boys  probably  spent  part  of  the  day  at  one  school  and 


A  Greek  Boy 


lo         A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

part  at  the  other,  though  this  is  not  certain.  ,  They  may  have 
attended  the  two  schools  on  alternate  days.  From  sixteen  to 
eighteen,  if  his  parents  were  able,  the  boy  attended  a  state-sup- 
ported gymnasium,  where  an  advanced  type  of  physical  training 
was  given,  i  As  this  was  preparatory  for  the  next  two  years  of 
army  service,  the  gymnasia  were  supported  by  the  State  more  as 
preparedness  measures  than  as  educational  institutions,  though 
they  partook  of  the  nature  of  both. 

Early  childhood.  As  at  Sparta  the  infant  was  examined  at 
birth,  but  the  father,  and  not  a  coundl  of  citizens,  decided  whether 
or  not  it  was  to  be  "  exposed  "  or  preserved.  Three  ceremonies, 
of  ancient  tribal  origin,  marked  the  recognition  and  acceptance  of 
the  child. (If  approved,  the  child's  name  was  entered  on  the 
registry  of  the  clan,  and  he  might  then  aspire  to  citizenship  and 
inherit  property  from  his  parent  (R.  4). ' 

Up  to  the  age  of  seven  both  boys  and  girls  grew  up  together  in 
the  home,  under  the  care  of  the  nurse  and  mother,  engaging  in 
much  the  same  games  and  sports  as  do  children  anywhere.  From 
the  first  they  were  carefully  disciplined  for  good  behavior  and  for 
the  establishment  of  self-control  (R.  3).  After  the  age  of  seven 
the  boy  and  girl  parted  company  in  the  matter  of  their  education, 
the  girl  remaining  closely  secluded  in  the  home  (women  and  chil- 
dren were  usually  confined  to  the  upper  floor  of  the  house)  and 
being  instructed  in  the  household  arts  by  her  mother,  while  the 
boy  went  to  different  teachers  for  his  education.  Probably  many 
girls  learned  to  read  and  write  from  their  mothers  or  nurses,  and 
the  daughters  of  well-to-do  citizens  learned  to  spin,  weave,  sew,  and 
embroider.    Music  was  also  a  common  accomplishment  of  women. 

The  school  of  the  grammatist.  A  Greek  boy,  unlike  a  mod- 
em school  child,  did  not  go  to  one  teacher.  Instead  he  had  at 
least  two  teachers,  and  sometimes  three.  To  the  grammatist,  who 
was  doubtless  an  evolution  from  an  earlier  tribal  scribe,  he  went 
to  learn  to  read  and  write  and  count.  The  grammatist  repre- 
sented the  earliest  or  primary  teacher.  To  the  music,  teacher, 
who  probably  at  first  taught  reading  and  writing  also,  he  went 
for  his  instruction  in  music  and  literature.  Finally,  to  the 
palcBstra  he  went  for  instruction  in  physical  training  (R.  3). 

Reading  was  taught  by  first  learning  the  letters,  then  syllables, 
and  finally  words.  Plaques  of  baked  earth,  on  which  the  alpha- 
bet was  written,  like  the  more  modem  hombook  (see  Figure 
49),  were  frequently  used.   The  ease  with  which  modem  children 


THE  OLD  GREEK  EDUCATION 


II 


leam  to  read  was  unknown  in  Greece.  Reading  was  very  difficult 
to  leam,  as  accentuation,  punctuation,  spacing  between  words, 
and  small  letters  had  not  as 


'p^W^m^'<  B  OU  E  i  KAI  TO  I  L^ 


Fig.  3.  An  Athenian  Inscription 

A  decree  of  the  Council  and  Assembly, 
dating  from  about  450  b.c.  Note  the  diffi- 
culty of  trying  to  read,  without  any  punc- 
tuation, and  with  only  capital  letters. 


yet  been  introduced.  As  a  re- 
sult the  study  required  much 
time,  and  much  personal  in- 
genuity had  to  be  exercised 
in  determining  the  meaning 
of  a  sentence.  The  inscrip- 
tion shown  in  Figure  3  will 
illustrate  the  difficulties  quite 
well.  The  Athenian  accent, 
too,  was  hard  to  acquire. 

"^       The  pupil  learned  to  write 

"=^  by  first  tracing,  with  the  sty- 
lus, letters  cut  in  wax  tablets, 
and  later  by  copying  exercises  set  for  him  by  his  teacher,  using 
the  wax  tablet  and  writing  on  his  knee.  \  Still  later  the  pupil 
learned  to  write  with  ink  on  papyrus  or  parchment,  though,  due 
to  the  cost  of  parchment  in  ancient  times,  this  was  not  greatly 
used.     Slates  and  paper  were  of  course  unknown  in  Greece. 

There  was  little  need  for  arithmetic,  and  but  little  was  taught. 
Arithmetic  such  as  we  teach  would 
have  been  impossible  with  their  cum- 
brous system  of  notation.  Only  the 
elements  of  counting  were  taught,  the 
Greek  using  his  fingers  or  a  counting- 
board,  such  as  is  shown  in  Figure  5, 
to  do  his  simple  reckoning. 

Great  importance  of  reading  and 
literature.  After  the  pupil  had  learned 


Fig.  s 
A  Greek  Counting-Board 

Pebbles  of  different  size  or  color 
were  used  for  thousands,  hun- 
dreds, tens,  and  units.  Their 
position  on  the  board  gave  them 
their  values.  The  board  now 
shows  the  total  15,379. 

to  read,  much  attention  was  given  to  accentuation  and  articula- 
tion, in  order  to  secure  beautiful  reading.    Still  more,  in  read- 


Five  Times 

Unity 

Thou 

sands 

•  •• 

Hun 

dreds 

•  •• 

Te 

as 

• 

•  • 

Un 

its 

• 

•  ••• 

Greek  Writing-Materials 


V 

12         A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

/ng  or  reciting,  the  parts  were  acted  out.  The  Greeks  were  a  na- 
/tion  of  actors,  and  the  recitations  in  the  schools  and  the  acting 
in  the  theaters  gave  plenty  of  opportunity  for  expression.  There 
were  no  schoolbooks,  as  we  know  them.  The  master  dictated 
and  the  pupils  wrote  down,  or,  not  uncommonly,  learned  by 
heart  what  the  master  dictated.  Ink  and  parchment  were  now 
used,  the  boy  making  his  own  schoolbooks.  Homer  was  the  first 
and  the  great  reading  book  of  the  Greeks,  the  Iliad  and  the 
Odyssey  being  the  Bible  of  the  Greek  people. 

The  music  school.  \The  teacher  in  this  school  gradually  sepa- 
rated himself  from  the  grammatist,  and  often  the  two  were  found 
in  adjoining  rooms  in  the  same  school.  In  his  functions  he  suc- 
ceeded the  wandering  poet  or  minstrel  of  earlier  times.  Music 
teachers  were  common  in  all  the  City-States  of  Greece.  To  this 
teacher  the  boy  went  at  first  to  recite  his  poetry,  and  after  the 
thirteenth  year  for  a  special  music  course.  The  teacher  was 
known  as  a  citharist,  and  the  instrument  used  was  the  seven- 
stringed  lyre.  Rhythm,  melody,  and  the  feeling  for  measure  and 
time  were  important  in  instruction,  whose  office  was  to  soothe, 
purge,  and  harmonize  man  within  and  make  him  fit  for  moral 
instruction  through  the  poetry  with  which  their  music  was  ever 
associated.  Instead  of  being  a  distinct  art,  as  with  us,  and  taught 
by  itself,  music  with  the  Greeks  was  always  subsidiary  to  the 
expression  of  the  spirit  of  their  literature,  and  in  aim  it  was  for 
moral-training  ends. 

The  first  lessons  taught  the  use  of  the  instrument,  and  the  sim- 
ple chants  of  the  religious  services  were  learned.  As  soon  as  the 
pupil  knew  how  to  play,  the  master  taught  him  to  render  the 
works  of  the  great  lyric  poets  of  Greece.  Poetry  and  music  to- 
gether thus  formed  a  single  art.  At  thirteen  a  special  music 
course  began  which  lasted  until  sixteen,  but  which  only  the  sons 
of  the  more  well-to-do  citizens  attended.  Every  boy,  though, 
learned  some  music,  not  that  he  might  be  a  musician,  but  that  he 
might  be  musical  and  able  to  perform  his  part  at  social  gatherings 
and  participate  in  the  religious  services  of  the  State.  Profes- 
sional playing  was  left  to  slaves  and  foreigners,  and  was  deemed 
unworthy  a  free  man  and  a  citizen.  ProfessionaUsm  in  either 
music  or  athletics  was  regarded  as  disgraceful.  The  purpose  of 
both  activities  was  harmonious  personal  development,  which  the 
Greeks  believed  contributed  to  moral  worth. 
The  palaestra;  gymnastics.     Very  unlike  our  modem  educa- 


THE  OLD  GREEK  EDUCATION  13 

tion,  fully  one  half  of  a  boy's  school  life,  from  eight  to  sixteen,  was 
given  to  sports  and  games  in  another  school  under  different  teach- 
ers, known  as  the  pakestraA  The  work  began  gradually,  but  by 
fifteen  had  taken  precedence  over  other  studies.'  As  in  music, 
harmonious  physical  development  and  moral  ends  were  held  to 
be  of  fundamental  importance.  The  standards  of  success  were 
far  from  our  modern  standards.  To  win  the  game  was  of  little 
significance;  the  important  thing  was  to  do  the  part  gracefully 
and,  for  the  person  concerned,  well.  To  attain  to  a  graceful  and 
dignified  carriage  of  the  body,  good  physical  health,  perfect  con- 
trol of  the  temper,  and  to  develop  quickness  of  perception,  self- 
possession,  ease,  and  skill  in  the  games  were  the  aims  —  not  mere 
strength  or  athletic  prowess  (R.  2).  Only  a  few  were  allowed  to 
train  for  participation  in  the  Olympian  games. 

The  work  began  ^ith  children's  games,  contests  in  nmning,  and 
ball  games  of  various  kinds.  Deportment  —  how  to  get  up,  walk, 
sit,  and  how  to  achieve  easy  manners  —  was  taught  by  the  mas- 
ters. After  the  pupils  came  to  be  a  little  older  there  was  a  definite 
course  of  study,  which  included,  in  succession:  (i)  leaping  and 
jumping,  for  general  bodily  and  lung  development;  (2)  running 
contests,  for  agihty  and  endurance;  (3)  throwing  the  discus,  for 
arm  exercise;  (4)  casting  the  javelin,  for  bodily  poise  and  coordi- 
nation of  movement,  as  well  as  for  future  use  in  hunting;  (5)  boxing 
and  wrestling,  for  quickness,  agility,  endurance,  and  the  control  of 
the  temper  and  passions.  Swimming  and  dancing  were  also  in- 
cluded for  all,  dancing  being  a  slow  and  graceful  movement  of  the 
body  to  music,  to  develop  grace  of  motion  and  beauty  of  form,  and 
to  exercise  the  whole  human  being,  body  and  soul.  The  minuet 
and  some  of  our  folk-dancing  are  our  nearest  approach  to  the 
Greek  type  of  dancing,  though  still  not  like  it.  The  modem  part- 
ner dance  was  unknown  in  ancient  Greece. 

The  exercises  were  performed  in  classes,  or  in  small  groups. 
V^They  took  place  in  the  open  air,  and  on  a  dirt  or  sandy  floor.  / 
They  were  accompanied  by  music  —  usually  the  flute,  played  by 
a  paid  performer.  A  number  of  teachers  looked  after  the  boys, 
examining  them  physically,  supervising  the  exercises,  directing 
the  work,  and  giving  various  forms  of  instruction. 

The  g3minasial  training,  sixteen  to  eighteen.  |  Up  to  this  point 
the  education  provided  was  a  private  and  a  farriily  affair.  /  In  the 
home  and  in  the  school  the  boy  had  now  been  trained  to  be  a  gen- 
tleman, to  revere  the  gods,  to  be  moral  and  upright  according  to 


14         A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

Greek  standards,  and  in  addition  he  had  been  given  that  training 
in  reading,  writing,  music,  and  athletic  exercises  that  the  State 
required  parents  to  furnish,  j  It  is  certain  that  many  boys,  whose 
parents  could  ill  afford  further  expense  for  schooling,  were  allowed 
to  quit  the  schools  at  from  thirteen  to  fifteen.  Those  who  ex- 
pected to  become  full  citizens,  however,  and  to  be  a  part  of  the 
government  and  hold  office,  were  required  to  continue  until 
twenty  years  of  age. J  Two  years  more  were  spent  in  schooling, 
largely  athletic,  and  two  years  additional  in  military  service.  Of 
/this  additional  training,  if  his  parents  chose  and  could  afford  it, 
/the  State  now  took  control. 
1  For  the  years  from  sixteen  to  eighteen  the  boy  attended  a  state 
gymnasium, )oi  which  two  were  erected  outside  of  Athens  by  the 
State,  in  groves  of  trees,  in  590  B.C.  The  boy  now  had  for  teach- 
ers a  number  of  gymnasts  of  ability.  The  old  exercises  of  the 
palcEstra  were  continued,  but  running,  wrestling,  and  boxing 
were  much  emphasized.  The  youth  learned  to  run  in  armor, 
while  wrestling  and  boxing  became  more  severe.  He  also  learned 
to  ride  a  horse,  to  drive  a  chariot,  to  sing  and  dance  in  the  public 
choruses,  and  to  participate  in  the  public  state  and  religious 
processions. 

Still  more,  the  youth  now  passed  from  the  supervision  of  a  fam- 
ily pedagogue  to  the  supervision  of  the  State.  For  the  first  time 
in  his  Ufe  he  was  now  free  to  go  where  he  desired  about  the  city; 
to  frequent  the  streets,  market-place,  and  theater;  to  listen  to 
debates  and  jury  trials,  and  to  witness  the  great  games;  and  to 
mix  with  men  in  the  streets  and  to  mingle  somewhat  in  public 
affairs.  He  saw  little  of  girls,  except  his  sisters,  but  formed  deep 
friendships  with  other  young  men  of  his  age.  Aside  from  a  re- 
quirement that  he  learn  the  laws  of  the  State,  his  education  during 
this  period  was  entirely  physical  and  civic.  If  he  abused  his  lib- 
erty he  was  taken  in  hand  by  pubHc  officials  charged  with  the 
supervision  of  public  morals.  He  was,  however,  still  regarded  as 
a  minor,  and  his  father  (or  guardian)  was  held  responsible  for  his 
public  behavior. 

The  citizen-cadet  years,  eighteen  to  twenty.  The  supervision 
of  the  State  during  the  preceding  two  years  had  in  a  way  been 
joint  with  that  of  his  father;  now  the  State  took  complete  control. 
At  the  age  of  eighteen  his  father  took  him  before  the  proper  au- 
thorities of  his  district  or  ward  in  the  city,  and  presented  him  as  a 
candidate  for  citizenship.    He  was  examined  morally  and  physi- 


THE  OLD  GREEK  EDUCATION  15 

cally,  and  if  sound,  and  if  the  records  showed  that  he  was  the 
legitimate  son  of  a  citizen,  his  name  was  entered  on  the  register  of 
his  ward  as  a  prospective  member  of  it  (R.  4).  His  long  hair  was 
now  cut,  he  donned  the  black  garb  of  the  citizen,  was  presented  to 
the  people  along  with  others  at  a  public  ceremony,  was  publicly 
armed  with  a  spear  and  a  shield,  and  then,  proceeding  to  one 
of  the  shrines  of  the  city,  on  a  height  overlooking  it,  he  solenmly 
took  the  Ephebic  oath : 

I  will  never  disgrace  these  sacred  arms,  nor  desert  my  companion 
in  the  ranks.  I  will  fight  for  temples  and  public  propaty,  both  alone 
and  with  many.  I  will  transmit  my  fatherland,  not  only  not  less,  but 
greater  and  better,  than  it  was  transmitted  to  me.  I  will  obey  the 
magistrates  who  may  at  any  time  be  in  power.  I  will  observe  both  the 
existing  laws  and  those  which  the  people  may  unanimously  hereafter 
make,  and,  if  any  person  seek  to  annul  the  laws  or  to  set  them  at 
naught,  I  will  do  my  best  to  prevent  him,  and  will  defend  them  both 
alone  and  with  many.  I  will  honor  the  religion  of  my  fathers.  And 
I  call  to  witness  Aglauros,  Enyalios,  Ares,  Zeus,  Thallo,  Auxo,  and 
Hegemone. 

He  was  now  an  Ephebos,  or  citizen-cadet,  with  still  two  years  of 
severe  training  ahead  of  him  before  he  could  take  up  the  fiil 
duties  of  citizenship.  The  first  year  he  spent  in  and  near  Athens 
learning  to  be  a  soldier.  He  did  what  recruits  do  almost  every- 
where —  drill,  camp  in  the  open,  leam  the  army  methods  and  dis- 
cipline, and  march  in  public  processions  and  take  part  in  religious 
festivals.  This  first  year  was  much  like  that  of  new  troops  in  camp 
being  worked  into  real  soldiers.  At  the  end  of  the  year  there  was 
a  public  drill  and  inspection  of  the  cadets,  after  which  they  were 
sent  to  the  frontier.  It  was  now  his  business  to  come  to  know  his 
country  thoroughly  —  its  topography,  roads,  springs,  seashores, 
and  mountain  passes.  He  also  assisted  in  enforcing  law  and  order 
throughout  the  country  districts,  as  a  sort  of  a  state  constabulary 
or  rural  police.  At  the  end  of  this  second  year  of  practical  train- 
ing the  second  examination  was  held,  the  cadet  was  now  admitted 
to  full  citizenship,  and  passed  to  the  ranks  of  a  trained  citizen  in 
the  reserve  army  of  defense,  as  does  a  boy  in  Switzerland  to-day 
(R.  4). 

Results  under  the  old  Greek  system.  Such  was  the  educa- 
tional system  which  was  in  time  evolved  from  the  earlier  tribal 
practices  of  the  citizens  of  old  Athens.  If  we  consider  Sparta  as 
representing  the  earlier  tribal  education  of  the  Greek  peoples,  we 
see  how  far  the  Athenians,  due  to  their  wonderful  ability  to  make 


i6  A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

progress,  were  able  to  advance  beyond  this  earlier  type  of  prepa- 
ration for  citizenship  (R.  5).  [Not  only  did  Athens  surpass  all 
Greece,  but,  for  the  first  time  in  the  history  of  the  world,  we  find 
here,  expressing  itself  in  the  education  of  the  young,  the  modem,/ 
western,  individualistic  and  democratic  spirit,  as  opposed  to  the 
deadening  caste  and  governmental  systems  of  the  East.  Here  first 
we  find  a  free  people  living  under  political  conditions  which  favored 
liberty,  culture,  and  intellectual  growth,  and  using  their  liberty 
to  advance  the  culture  and  the  knowledge  of  the  people  (R.  6). 
\  Here  also  we  find,  for  the  first  time,  the  thinkers  of  the  State 
deeply  concerned  with  the  (education  of  the  youth  of  the  State,  ^ 
and  viewing  education  as  a  necessity  to  make  life  worth  living  and 
secure  the  State  from  dangers,  both  within  and  without.  To  pre- 
pare men  by  a  severe  but  simple  and  honest  training  to  fear  the 
gods,  to  do  honest  work,  to  despise  comfort  and  vice,  to  obey  the 
law'^'to  respect  their  neighbors  and  themselves,  and  to  reverence 
theAvisdom  of  their  race,  was  the  aim  of  this  old  education.  -The 
schooling  for  citizenship  was  rigid,  almost  puritanical,  but  it  pro- 
dvced  wonderful  results,  both  in  peace  and  in  war.  Men  thus 
lined  guided  the  destinies  of  Athens  during  some  two  centuries, 
id  the  despotism  of  the  East  as  represented  by  Persia  could  not 
lefeat  them  at  Marathon,  Salamis,  and  Plataea. 
The  simple  and  effective  curriculum.  The  simplicity  of  the 
^curriculum  was  one  of  its  marked  features.  In  a  manner  seldom 
witnessed  in  the  world's  educational  history,  the  Greeks  used 
their  religion,  literature,  government,  and  the  natural  activities 
of  young  men  to  impart  an  education  of  wonderful  effectiveness. 
The  subjects  we  have  valued  so  highly  for  training  were  to  them 
unknown.  They  taught  no  arithmetic  or  grammar,  no  science, 
no  drawing,  no  higher  mathematics,  and  no  foreign  tongue. 
Music,  the  literature  and  religion  of  their  own  people,  careful 
physical  training,  and  instruction  in  the  duties  and  practices  of 
citizenship  constituted  the  entire  curriculum. 
Cit  was  an  education  by  doirfg;  not  one'of  learning  from  books. 
That  it  was  an  attractive  type  of  education  there  is  abundant 
testimony  by  the  Greeks  themselves.  We  have  not  as  yet  come 
to  value  physical  education  as  did  the  Greeks,  nor  are  we  nearly 
so  successful  in  our  moral  education,  despite  the  aid  of  the  Chris- 
tian religion  which  they  did  not  know.  It  was,  to  be  sure,  class 
education,  and  limited  to  but  a  small  fraction  of  the  total  popu- 
lation.    In  it  girls  had  no  share.     There  were  many  features  of 


THE  OLD  GREEK  EDUCATION  17 

Greek  life,  too,  that  are  repugnant  to  modem  conceptions.  Yet, 
despite  these  limitations,  the  old  education  of  Athens  still  stands 
as  one  of  the  most  successful  in  its  results  of  any  system  of  edu- 
cation which  has  been  evolved  in  the  history  of  the  world.  Con- 
sidering its  time  and  place  in  the  history  of  the  world  and  that  it . 
was  a  development  for  which  there  were  nowhere  any  precedents, 
it  represented  a  very  wonderful  evolution.        /  r—  y 

QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION  ^TT:^'  ~ 

1.  Why  are  imaginative  ability  and  many-sided  natures  such  valuable 
characteristics  for  any  people? 

2.  Is  the  ability  to  make  progressive  changes,  possessed  so  markedly  by 
the  Athenian  Greeks,  an  important  personal  or  racial  characteristic? 
Why? 

.  3.  Are  the  Athenian  characteristics,  stated  in  the  text  of  page  6,  charac- 
teristics capable  of  development  by  training,  or  are  they  native,  or 
both? 
I  4.  How  do  you  explain  the  Greek  failure  to  achieve  political  unity? 
^  5.  Would  education  for  citizenship  with  us  to-day  possess  the  same  defects 

as  in  ancient  Greece?     Why?     Do  we  give  an  equivalent  training? 
»  6.  Which  is  the  better  attitude  for  a  nation  to  assume  toward  the  foreigner 

—  the  Greek,  or  the  American?     Why? 
\  7.  Why  does  a  state  military  socialism,  such  as  prevailed  at  Sparta,  tend 

to  produce  a, people  of  mediocre  intellectual  capacity? 
\  8.  How  do  you  account  for  the  Athenian  State  leaving  literary  and  musical 
education  to  private  initiative,  but  supporting  state  gymnasia? 
9.  Would  the  Athenian  method  of  instruction  have  been  possible  had  all 
children  in  the  State  been  given  an  education?     Why? 
*^io.  How  did  the  education  of  an  Athenian  girl  differ  from  that  of  a  girl  in 

the  early  American  colonies? 
I   II.  Why  did  the  Greek  boy  need  three  teachers,  whereas  the  American  boy 

is  taught  all  and  more  by  one  primary  teacher? 
V  12.  Contrast  the  Greek  method  of  instruction  in  music,  and  the  purposes 

of  the  instruction,  with  our  own. 
4_^  13.  How  could  we  incorporate  into  our  school  instruction  some  of  the  im- 
portant aspects  of  Greek  instrucrion  in  music? 
^  14.  What  do  you  think  of  the  contentions  of  Aristotle  and  Plato  that  the 
State  should  control  school  music  as  a  means  of  seciuing  soimd  moral 
instruction? 
^^15.  Does  the  Greek  idea  that  a  harmonious  personal  development  contrib- 
utes to  moral  worth  appeal  to  you?     Why? 
^  16.  Contrast  the  Greek  ideal  as  to  athletic  training  with  the  conception  of 

athletics  held  by  an  average  American  schoolboy. 
y   17.  Contrast  the  education  of  a  Greek  boy  at  sixteen  with  that  of  an  Ameri- 
can boy  at  the  same  age. 
^  18.  Contrast  the  emphasis  placed  on  expression  as  a  method  in  teaching  in 

the  schools  of  Athens  and  of  the  United  States. 
^  19.  Do  the  needs  of  modem  society  and  industrial  Hfe  warrant  the  greater 
emphasis  we  place  on  learning  from  books,  as  opposed  to  the  learning 
by  doing  of  the  Greeks? 
20.  Compare  the  compulsory-school  period  of  the  Greeks  with  our  own. 


i8         A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

If  we  were  to  add  some  form  of  compulsory  military  training,  for  all 
youths  between  eighteen  and  twenty,  and  as  a  preparedness  measure, 
would  we  approach  still  more  nearly  the  Greek  requirements? 

21.  Explain  how  the  Athenian  Greeks  reconciled  the  idea  of  social  service  to 
the  State  with  the  idea  of  individual  liberty,  through  a  form  of  education 
which  developed  personality.  Compare  this  with  our  American  ideal. 
'  2  2.  The  Greek  schoolboy  had  no  long  summer  vacation,  as  do  American 
children.  Is  there  any  special  reason  why  we  need  it  more  than  did 
they? 

23.  Do  we  believe  that  virtue  can  be  taught  in  the  way  the  Hellenic  peoples 
did?    Do  we  carry  such  a  belief  into  practice? 

SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  selections  are  repro- 
duced: 

1.  Plutarch:  Ancient  Education  in  Sparta. 

2.  Plato:  An  Athenian  Schoolboy's  Life. 

3.  Lucian:  An  Athenian  Schoolboy's  Day. 

4.  Aristotle:  Athenian  Citizenship  and  the  Ephebic  Years. 

5.  Freeman:  Sparta  and  Athens  compared. 

6.  Thucydides:  Athenian  Education  summarized. 

(For  Supplemental  References,  see  following  chapter.) 


4viyM4 


^'^^'^^   '     CHAPTER  II  f^*"^ 

LATER  GREEK  EDUCATION    -^ 

III.  THE  NEW  GREEK  EDUCATIOPjJ^ 

Political  events:  The  Golden  Age  of  Greece.(  The  Battle  of 
Marathon  (490  B.C.)  has  long  been  considered  one  of  the  "decisive 
battles  of  the  world."  Had  the  despotism  of  the  East  triumphed 
here,  and  in  the  subsequent  campaign  that  ended  in  the  defeat  of 
■  '  the  Persian  fleet  at  Salamis  (480  B.C.)  and  of  the  Persian  army  at 
'  j  Plataea  (479  b.c),  the  whole  history  of  our  western  world  would 
^  have  been  different.  The  result  of  the  war  with  Persia  was  the 
^  triumph  of  this  new  western  democratic  civilization,  prepared 
, ,  and  schooled  for  great  national  emergencies  by  a  severe  but  effec- 
■i  tive  training,  over  the  uneducated  hordes  led  to  battle  by  the  au- 
^   tocracy  of  the  East. 

Marathon  broke  the  spell  of  the  Persian  name  and  freed  the 
i   more  progressive  Greeks  to  pursue  their  intellectual  and  political 
y^^evelopment.  Above  all  it  revealed  the  strength  and  power  of  the 
Athenians  to  themselves,  and  in  the  half-century  following  the  most 
wonderful  poHtical,  literary,  and  artistic  development  the  world 
had  ever  known  ensued,  and  the  highest  products  of  Greek  civili- 
zation were  attained.    Attica  had  braved  everything  for  the  com- 
on  cause  of  Greece,  even  to  leaving  Athens  to  be  burned  by  the 
invader,  and  for  the  next  fifty  years  she  held  the  position  of  politi- 
cal as  well  as  cultural  preeminence  among  the  Greek  City-States. 
(Athens  now  became  the  world  center  of  wealth  and  refinement 
and  the  home  of  art  and  literature  (R.  7),  and  her  influence  along 
cultural  lines,  due  in  part  to  her  mastery  of  the  sea  and  her  grow- 
ing commerce,  was  now  extended  throughout  the  Mediterranean 
world. 

From  479  to  431  B.C.  was  the  Golden  Age  of  Greece,  and  "  dur- 
ing this  short  period  Athens  gave  birth  to  more  great  men  — 
^  poets,  artists,  statesmen,  and  philosophers  —  than  all  the  world 
^,  beside  had  produced  in  any  period  of  equal  length." 

Transition  from  the  old  to  the  new.  As  early  as  509  B.C.  a  new 
constitution  had  admitted  all  the  free  inhabitants  of  Attica  to 
citizenship,  and  the  result  was  a  rapid  increase  in  the  prestige, 
property,  and  culture  of  Athens.     Citizenship  was  now  open  to 


20  A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

the  commercial  classes,  and  no  longer  restricted  to  a  small,  prop- 
erly bom,  and  properly  educated  class.  Wealth  now  became  im- 
portant in  giving  leisure  to  the  citizen,  and  was  no  longer  looked 
down  upon  as  it  had  been  in  the  earlier  period.  After  the  Pelo- 
ponnesian  War  the  predominance  of  Attica  among  the  Greek 
States,  the  growth  of  commerce,  the  constant  interchange  of  em- 
bassies, the  travel  overseas  of  Athenian  citizens,  and  the  presence 
of  many  foreigners  in  the  State  all  alike  led  to  a  tolerance  of  new 
ideas  and  a  criticism  of  old  ones  which  before  had  been  unknown. 

Changes  in  the  old  education.  A  number  of  changes  in  the 
character  of  the  old  education  were  now  gradually  introduced. 
The  rigid  drill  of  the  earlier  period  began  to  be  replaced  by  an 
easier  and  a  more  pleasurable  type  of  training.  Gymnastics  for 
personal  enjoyment  began  to  replace  drill  for  the  service  of  the 
State,  and  was  much  less  rigid  in  type.  The  old  authors,  who  had 
rendered  important  service  in  the  education  of  youth,  began  to  be 
replaced  by  more  modem  writers,  with  a  distinct  loss  of  the  earUer 
religious  and  moral  force.  New  musical  instruments,  giving  a 
softer  and  more  pleasurable  effect,  took  the  place  of  the  seven- 
stringed  lyre,  and  complicated  music  replaced  the  simple  Doric 
airs  of  the  earlier  period.  Education  became  much  more  indj- 
vidual,  literary,  and  theoretical^  Geometry  and  drawing  were 
introduced  as  new  studies,  ^^rammar  and  rhetoric  began  to  be 
studied,  discussion  was  introduced,  and  a  certain  glibness  of 
speech  began  to  be  prized.  The  citizen-cadet  years,  from  sixteen 
to  twenty,  formerly  devoted  to  rather  rigorous  physical  training, 
were  now  changed  to  school  work  of  an  intellectual  type. 

New  teachers ;  the  Sophists.  New  teachers,  known  as  Sophists, 
who  professed  to  be  able  to  train  men  for  a  political  career,  began 
to  offer  a  more  practical  course  designed  to  prepare  boys  for  the 
newer  type  of  state  service.  These  in  time  drew  many  Ephebes 
into  their  private  schools,  where  the  chief  studies  were  on  the 
content,  form,  and  practical  use  of  the  Greek  language.  Rhetoric 
and  grammar  before  long  became  the  master  studies  of  this  new 
period,  as  they  were  felt  to  prepare  boys  better  for  the  new  politi- 
cal and  intellectual  life  of  Hellas  than  did  the  older  type  of  train- 
ing. In  the  schools  of  the  Sophists  boys  now  spent  their  time  in 
forming  phrases,  choosing  words,  examining  grammatical  struc- 
ture, and  learning  how  to  secure  rhetorical  effect.  Many  of  these 
new  teachers  made  most  extravagant  claims  for  their  instruction 
(R.  8)  and  drew  much  ridicule  from  the  champions  of  the  older 


LATER  GREEK  EDUCATION  21 

type  of  education,  but  within  a  century  they  had  thoroughly  es- 
tablished themselves,  and  had  permanently  changed  the  character 
of  the  earlier  Greek  education. 

By  350  B.C.  we  find  that  Greek  school  education  had  been 
differentiated  into  three  divisions,  as  follows: 

1.  Primary  education,  covering  the  years  from  seven  or  eight  to 
thirteen,  and  embracing  reading,  writing,  arithmetic,  and  chant- 
ing. The  teacher  of  this  school  came  to  be  known  as  a  gratn- 
matist. 

2.  Secondary  education,  covering  the  years  from  thirteen  to  sixteen, 
and  embracing  geometry,  drawing,  and  a  special  music  course. 
Later  on  some  grammar  and  rhetoric  were  introduced  into  this 
school.  The  teacher  of  this  school  came  to  be  known  as  a  gram- 
maticus. 

3.  Higher  or  university  education,  covering  the  years  after  sixteen. 

The  flood  of  individualism.  This  period  of  artistic  and  intel- 
lectual brilliancy  of  Greece  following  the  Peloponnesian  War 
marked  the  beginning  of  the  end  of  Greece  politically.  The  war 
was  a  blow  to  the  strength  of  Greece  from  which  the  dififerent 
States  never  recovered.  Greece  was  bled  white  by  this  needless 
civil  strife,  ^^^he  tendencies  toward  individualism  in  education 
were  symptomatic  of  tendencies  in  all  forms  of  social  and  political 
life?;  The  philosophers  —  Xenophon,  Plato,  and  Aristotle  — 
prqposed  ideal  remedies  for  the  evils  of  the  State,  but  in  vain. 
The  old  ideal  of  citizenship  died  out.  Service  to  the  State  be- 
came purely  subordinate  to  personal  pleasure  and  advancement. 
Irreverence  and  a  scoffing  attitude  became  ruling  tendencies. 
Family  morality  decayed.  The  State  in  time  became  corrupt  and 
nerveless.  Finally,  in  338  B.C.,  PhiHp  of  Macedon  became  master 
of  Greece,  and  annexed  it  to  the  world  empire  which  he  and  his 
son  Alexander  created.  Still  later,  in  146  B.C.,  the  new  world 
power  to  the  west,  Rome,  conquered  Greece  and  made  of  it  a 
Roman  province. 

Though  dead  politically,  there  now  occurred  the  imusual  spec- 
tacle of  'captive  Greece  taking  captive  her  rude  conqueror,"  and 
spreading  Greek  art,  literature,  philosophy,  science,  and  Greek 
ideas  throughout  the  Mediterranean  world.  It  was  the  Greek 
higher  learning  that  now  became  predominant  and  exerted  such 
great  influence  on  the  future  of  our  world  civilization.  It  remains 
now  to  trace  briefly  the  development  and  spread  of  this  higher 
learning,  and  to  point  out  how  thoroughly  it  modified  the  thinking 
of  the  future. 


22 


A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


Fig.  6 
Socrates  (469-399  b.c.) 

(After  a  marble  bust  in  the 
Vatican  Gallery,  at  Rome) 


New  schools;  Socrates.  In  the  beginning  each  Sophist  teacher 
was  a  free  lance,  and  taught  what  he  would  and  in  the  manner 
he  thought  best.  Many  of  them  made  extraordinary  efforts  to 
attract  students  and  win  popular  approval 
and  fees.  Plato  represents  the  Sophist 
Protagoras  as  saying,  with  reference  to  a 
youth  ambitious  for  success  in  political 
life,  "If  he  comes  to  me  he  will  leam  that 
which  he  comes  to  leam."  At  first  the 
instruction  was  largely  individual,  but 
later  classes  were  organized.  Isocrates, 
who  lived  from  393  to  338  B.C.,  organized 
the  instruction  for  the  first  time  into  a 
well-graded  sequence  of  studies,  with  defi- 
nite aims  and  work  (R.  8).  He  shifted 
the  emphasis  in  instruction  from  train- 
ing for  success  in  argumentation,  to  train- 
ing to  think  clearly  and  to  express  ideas 
properly.  His  pupils  were  unusually  suc- 
cessful, and  his  school  did  much  to  add  to  the  fame  of  Athens  as 
an  intellectual  center.  From  his  work  sprang  a  large  number  of 
so-caUed  Rhetorical  Schools,  much  like  our  better  private  schools 
and  academies,  offering  to  those  Ephebes  who  could  afford  to 
attend  a  very  good  preparation  for  participation  in  the  public  life 
of  the  period. 

In  contrast  with  the  Sophists,  a  series  of  schools  of  philosophy 
also  arose  in  Athens.  These  in  a  way  were  the  outgrowth  of  the 
work  of  Socrates.  Accepting  the  Sophists'  dictum  that  "man  is 
the  measure  of  all  things,"  he  tried  to  turn  youths  from  the"  baser- 
individuahsm  of  the  Sophists  of  his  day  to  the  larger  general 
truths  which  measure  the  Ufe  of  a  true  man.  In  particular  he 
tried  to  show  that  the  greatest  of  all  arts  —  the  art  of  living  a  good 
life  —  called  for  correct  individual  thinking  and  a  knowledge  of 
the  right.  "  Know  thyself  "  was  his  great  guiding  principle.  His 
emphasis  was  on  the  problems  of  everyday  morality.  Frankly 
accepting  the  change  from  the  old  education  as  a  change  that 
could  not  be  avoided,  he  sought  to  formulat^a  new  basis  for  edu- 
cation in  personal  morality  and  virtual  and  as  a  substitute  for  the 
old  training  for  service  to  the  State.  He  taught  by  conversation, 
engaging  men  in  argument  as  he  met  them  in  the  street,  and  show- 
ing to  them  their  ignorance  (R.  9).     Even  in  Athens,  where  free 


LATER  GREEK  EDUCATION  23 

speech  was  enjoyed  more  than  anywhere  else  in  the  world  at  that 
time,  such  a  shrewd  questioner  would  naturally  make  enemies, 
and  in  399  B.C.  at  the  age  of  seventy-one,  he  was  condemned  to 
death  by  the  Athenian  populace  on  the  charge  of  impiety  and  cor- 
rupting the  youth  of  Athens. 

Socrates'  greatest  disciple  was  a  citizen  of  wealth  by  the  name 
of  Plato,  who  had  abandoned  a  political  career  for  the  charms  of 
philosophy,  and  to  him  we  owe  our  chief  information  as  to  the 
work  and  aims  of  Socrates.f  In  386  B.C.  he  founded  the  Academy, 
where  he  passed  almost  forty  years  in  lecturing  and  writing.  His 
school,  which  formed  a  model  for  others,  consisted  of  a  miion  of 
teachers  and  students  who  possessed  in  cormnon  a  chapel,  library, 
lecture-rooms,  and  living-rooms.  Philosophy,  mathematics,  and 
science  were  taught,  and  women  as  well  as  men  were  admitted.  A 

Other  schools  of  importance  in  Athens  were  the  Lyceum,,  y^ 
founded  in  335  B.C.  by  a  foreign-bom  pupil  of  Plato's  by  the  name 
of  Aristotle,  who  did  a  remarkable  work  in  organizing  the  known 
knowledge  of  his  time;  the  school  of  the  Stoics,  founded  by  Zeno 
in  308  B.C. ;  and  the  school  of  the  Epicureans,  founded  by  Epicurus  y 
in  306  B.C.    Each  of  these  schools  offered  a  philosophical  solution  4^ 
of  tbe  problem  of  life,  and  Plato  and  Aristotle  wrote  treatises  on 
education  as  well.     Each  school  evolved  into  a  form  of  religious 
brotherhood  which  perpetuated  the  organization  after  the  death 
of  the  master.  (  In  time  these  became  largely  schools  for  expound- 
ing the  philosophy  of  the  founder,  y 

The  University  of  Athens.  Coincident  with  the  founding  of 
these  schools  and  the  pohtical  events  we  have  previously  recorded, 
certain  further  changes  in  Athenian  education  were  taking  place. 
The  character  of  the  changes  in  the  education  before  the  age  of 
sixteen  we  have  described.  As  a  result  in  part  of  the  development 
of  the  schools  of  the  Sophists,  which  were  in  themselves  only  at- 
tempts to  meet  fundamental  changes  in  Athenian  life,  the  edu- 
cation of  youths  after  sixteen  tended  to  become  literary,  rather 
than  physical  and  military.  The  Ephebic  period  of  service  (from 
eighteen  to  twenty)  was  at  first  reduced  from  two  years  to  one, 
and  after  the  Macedonian  conquest,  in  338  B.C.,  when  there  was 
no  longer  an  Athenian  State  to  serve  or  protect,  the  entire  period 
of  training  was  made  optional.  The  Ephebic  corps  was  now 
opened  to  foreigners,  and  in  time  became  merely  a  fashionable 
semi-military  group.  Instead  of  the  mihtary  training,  attendance 
at  the  lectures  of  the  philosophical  schools  was  now  required,  and 


I 


24         A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

attendance  at  the  rhetorical  schools  was  optional.  Later  the 
philosophical  schools  were  granted  public  support  by  the  Athe- 
nian Assembly,  professorships  were  created  over  which  the  Assem- 
bly exercised  supervision,  the  rhetorical  and  philosophical  schools 
were  gradually  merged,  the  study  years  were  extended  from  two  to 
six,  or  seven,  a  form  of  university  life  as  regards  both  students  and 
professors  was  developed,  and  what  has  since  been  termed  "The 
University  of  Athens"  was  evolved. 

As  Athens  lost  in  political  power  her  citizens  turned  their  atten- 
tion to  making  their  city  a  center  of  world  learning.  This  may  be 
said  to  have  been  accompHshed  by  200  B.C.  Though  Greece  had 
long  since  become  a  Macedonian  province,  and  was  soon  to  pass 
under  the  control  of  Rome,  ithe  so-called  University  of  Athens  was 
widely  known  and  much  frequented  for  the  next  three  hundred 
years,  and  continued  in  existence  until  finally  closed,  as  a  center 
of  pagan  thought,  by  the  edict  of  the  Roman-Christian  Emperor, 
Justinian,  in  529  a.d.  '  Though  reduced  to  the  rank  of  a  Roman 
provincial  town,  Athens  long  continued  to  be  a  city  of  letters  and 
a  center  of  philosophic  and  scientific  instruction. 

Spread  and  influence  of  Greek  higher  education.  Alexander 
the  Great  rendered  a  very  important  service  in  uniting  the  west- 
em  Orient  and  the  eastern  Mediterranean  into  a  common  world 
empire,  and  in  establishing  therein  a  common  language,  literature, 
philosophy,  a  common  interest,  and  a  common  body  of  scientific 
knowledge  and  law.  It  was  his  hope  to  create  a  new  empire,  in 
which  the  distinction  between  European  and  Asiatic  should  pass 
away. V. No  less  than  seventy  cities  were  established  with  a  view 
to  holding  his  empire  together.  These  served  to  spread  Hellenic 
culture.  Greek  schools,  Greek  theaters,  Greek  baths,  and  Greek 
institutions  of  every  type  were  to  be  found  in  practically  all  of 
them,  and  the  Greek  tongue  was  heard  in  them  all.  With  Alex- 
ander the  Great  the  history  of  Greek  life,  culture,  and  learning 
merges  into  that  of  the  history  of  the  ancient  world.  Everywhere 
throughout  the  new  empire  Greek  philosophers  and  scientists, 
architects  and  artists,  merchants  and  colonists,  followed  behind 
the  Macedonian  armies,  spreading  Greek  civilization  and  becom- 
ing the  teachers  of  an  enlarged  world.  "  Greek  cities  stretched 
from  the  Nile  to  the  Indus,  and  dotted  the  shores  of  the  Black  and 
the  Caspian  seas.  The  Greek  language,  once  the  tongue  of  a 
petty  people,  grew  to  be  a  universal  language  of  culture,  spoken 
even  by  barbarian  lips,  and  the  art,  the  science,  the  literature. 


LATER  GREEK  EDUCATION  25 

the  principles  of  politics  and  philosophy,  developed  in  isolation 
by  the  Greek  mind,  henceforth  became  the  heritage  of  many 
nations."  Greek  universities  were  established  at  Pergamum  and 
Tarsus  in  Asia  Minor;  at  Rhodes  on  the  island  of  that  name  in 
the  yEgean;  and  at  the  newly  founded  city  of  Alexandria  in  Egypt. 

Mingling  of  Orient  and  Occident  at  Alexandria.  The  most 
famous  of  all  these  Greek  institutions,  however,  was  the  Univer- 
sity of  Alexandria,  which  gradually  sapped  Athens  as  a  center  of 
learning  and  became  the  intellectual  capital  of  the  world.  The 
greatest  library  of  manuscripts  the  world  had  ever  known  was 
collected  together  here.  It  is  said  to  have  numbered  over 
700,000  volumes.  These  included  Greek,  Jewish,  Egyptian,  and 
Oriental  works.  In  connection  with  the  Hbrary  was  the  museum, 
where  men  of  letters  and  investigators  were  supported  at  royal 
expense.  These  two  constituted  an  institution  so  like  a  university 
that  it  has  been  given  that  name.  Alexandria  became  not  only  a 
great  center  of  learning,  but,  still  more  important,  the  chief  min- 
gling place  for  Greek,  Jew,  Egyptian,  Roman,  and  Oriental,  and 
here  Greek  philosophy,  Hebrew  and  Christian  religion,  and  Ori- 
ental faith  and  philosophy  met  and  mixed.  It  was  this  mingled 
civilization  and  culture,  all  tinged  through  and  through  with  the 
Greekj^with  which  the  Romans  came  in  contact  as  they  pushed 
their  conquering  armies  into  the  eastern  Mediterranean. 

Alexandria  sapped  in  turn.  In  30  B.C.  Alexandria,  too,  came- 
under  Roman  rule  and  was,  in  turn,  gradually  sapped  by  Rome, 
Greek  influence  continued,  but  the  interest  became  largely  philo- 
sophical, j  Ultimately  Alexandria  became  the  seat  of  a  metaphys- 
ical school  of  Christian  theology,  and  the  scene  of  bitter  religious 
controversies.  In  330  a.d.,  Constantinople  was  founded  on  the 
site  of  the  earlier  Byzantium,  and  soon  thereafter  Greek  scholars 
transferred  their  interest  to  it  and  made  it  a  new  center  of  Greek 
learning.  There  Greek  science,  literature,  and  philosophy  were 
preserved  for  ten  centuries,  and  later  handed  back  to  a  Europe 
just  awakening  from  the  long  intellectual  night  of  the  Middle 
Ages.  In  640  A.D.  Alexandria  was  taken  by  the  Mohammedans, 
and  the  university  ceased  to  exist.  The  great  library  was  de- 
stroyed, furnishing,  it  is  said,  "fuel  sufficient  for  four  thousand 
public  baths  for  a  period  of  six  months,"  and  Greek  learning  was 
extinguished  in  the  western  world. 

Our  debt  to  Hellas.  As  a  political  power  the  Greek  States  left 
the  world  nothing  of  importance.     As  a  people  they  were  too  in- 


26         A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

dividualistic,  and  seemed  to  have  a  strange  inability  to  unite  for 
•V-  political  purposes.  To  the  new  power  slowly  forming  to  the  west- 
I  ward  —  Rome  —  was  left  the  important  task,  which  the  Greek 
people  were  never  able  to  accomplish,  of  uniting  civilization  into 
^w^  one  political  whole.  The  world  conquest  that  Greece  made  was 
intellectual.  As  a  result,  her  contribution  to  civilization  was 
artistic,  literary,  philosophical,  and  scientific,  but  -not  political. 
The  Athenian  Greeks  were  a  highly  artistic  and  imaginative 
rather  than  a  practical  people.  They  spent  their  energy  on  other 
matters  than  government  and  conquest.  As  a  result  the  world 
will  be  forever  indebted  to  them  for  an  art  and  a  literature  of 
incomparable  beauty  and  richness  which  still  charms  mankind;  a 
philosophy  which  deeply  influenced  the  early  Christian  religion, 
and  has  ever  since  tinged  the  thinking  of  the  western  world;  and 
for  many  important  beginnings  in  scientific  knowledge  which  were 
lost  for  ages  to  a  world  that  had  no  interest  in  or  use  for  science. 
So  deeply  has  our  whole  western  civilization  been  tinctured  by 
Greek  thought  that  one  enthusiastic  writer  has  exclaimed,  — 
''Except  the  blind  forces  of  Nature,  nothing  moves  in  this  world 
which  is  not  Greek  in  its  origin."     (R.  ii.) 

In  education  proper  the  old  Athenian  education  offers  us  many 
lessons  of  importance  that  we  of  to-day  may  well  heed.  In  the 
emphasis  they  placed  on  moral  worth,  education  of  the  body  as 
■well  as  the  mind,  and  moderation  in  all  things,  they  were  much 
ahead  of  us.  Their  schools  became  a  type  for  the  cities  of  the 
entire  Mediterranean  world,  being  found  from  the  Black  Sea  south 
to  the  Persian  Gulf  and  westward  to  Spain.  When  Rome  became 
a  world  empire  the  Greek  school  system  was  adopted,  and  in  modi- 
fied form  became  dominant  in  Rome  and  throughout  the  prov- 
inces, while  the  universities  of  the  Greek  cities  for  long  furnished 
the  highest  form  of  education  for  ambitious  Roman  youths.  In 
this  way  Greek  influence  was  spread  throughout  the  Mediter- 
ranean world.  The  higher  learning  of  the  Greeks,  preserved  first  at 
Athens  and  Alexandria,  and  later  at  Constantinople,  was  finally 
handed  back  to  the  western  world  at  the  time  of  the  Italian  Revival 
of  Learning,  after  Europe  had  in  part  recovered  from  the  effects 
of  the  barbarian  deluge  which  followed  the  downfall  of  Rome. 

QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

I.  Try  to  picture  what  might  have  been  the  result  for  western  civilization 
had  the  small  and  newly-developed  democratic  civilization  of  Greece 


LATER  GREEK  EDUCATION  27 

been  crushed  by,  the  Persians  at  the  time  they  overran  the  Greek 
peninsula.  QyiAyC<A..Aj7    (>AA~y^  '  .  ~    -  , 

2.  Do  periods  of  great  political,  commercial,  and  intellectual  expansion  *        .  'I 
usually  subject  old  systems  of  morality  and  education  to  severe  strain?  ^^-^^t^lZljS 

3.  Why  was  the  change  in  the  type  of  Athenian  education  during  the       \a/0^^ 
Ephebic  years  a  natural  and  even  a  necessary  one  for  the  new  Athens? 

4.  Do  you  understand  that  the  system  of  training  before  the  Ephebic  years 
was  also  seriously  changed,  or  was  the  change  largely  a  re-shaping  and 
extension  of  the  education  of  youths  after  sixteen? 

5.  Were  the  Sophists  a  good  addition  to  the  Athenian  instructing  force,  or 
not?    Why? 

6.  How  may  a  State  establish  a  corrective  for  such  a  flood  of  individualism 
as  overwhelmed  Greece,  and  stiU  allow  individual  educational  initiative 
and  progress? 

7.  Do  we  as  a  nation  face  danger  from  the  flood  of  individualism  we  have 
encouraged  in  the  past?  How  is  our  problem  like  and  unlike  that  of 
Athens  after  the  Peloponnesian  War? 

8.  In  what  ways  was  the  conquest  of  Alexander  good  for  world  civilization? 

9.  Of  what  importance  is  it,  in  the  history  of  our  western  civilization,  that 
Greek  thought  had  so  thoroughly  permeated  the  eastern  Mediterranean 
world  before  Roman  armies  conquered  the  region? 

10.  Picture  for  yourself  the  great  intellectual  advances  of  the  Greeks  by  . 
contrasting  the  tribal  preparedness-type  of  education  of  the  early  Gre«k  A 
States  and  the  learning  possessed  by  the  scholars  of  OUexandria^T^'t.'^X't'V*^ 

11.  Compare  the  spread  of  Greek  language  and  knowledge  throughout  the 
eastern  Mediterranean  world,  following  the  conquests  of  Alexander, 
with  the  spread  of  the  Enghsh  language  and  ideas  as  to  government 
throughout  the  modem  world.        , 

^  (j  ^    SELECTED  READINGS 

V     In  me  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  selections  are  repro- 
>  duced: 

7.  Wilkins:  Athens  in  the  Time  of  Pericles. 

8.  Isocrates:  The  Instruction  of  the  Sophists. 

9.  Xenophon:  An  Example  of  Socratic  Teaching. 

10.  Draper:  The  Schools  of  Alexandria. 

11.  Butcher:  What  we  Owe  to  Greece. 


SUPPLEMENTAL  REFERENCES 

The  most  important  references  are  indicated  by  an  * 

*  Bcvan,  J.  O.     University  Life  in  Olden  Time. 

*  Butcher,  S.  H.     Some  Aspects  of  the  Greek  Genius. 

*  Davidson,  Thos.     Aristotle,  and  Ancient  Educational  Ideals. 

*  Freeman,  K.  J.    Schools  of  Hellas.  ■ 
Guhck,  C.  B.     The  Life  of  the  Ancient  Greeks. 

*  Kingsley,  Chas.     Alexandria  and  her  Schools. 

Laurie,  S.  S.    Historical  Survey  of  Pre-Christian  Education. 

*  Mahaffy,  J.  P.    Old  Greek  Education. 

Sandys,  J.  E.     History  of  Classical  Scholarship,  vol.  I. 

Walden,  John  W.  H.     The  Universities  of  Ancient  Greece. 

Wilkins,  A.  S.    National  Education  in  Greece  in  the  Fourth  Century,  B.C. 


CHAPTER  III 

THE  EDUCATION  AND  WORK  OF  ROME 

I.  THE  ROMANS  AND  THEIR  MISSION 

Development  of  the  Roman  State.  About  the  time  that  the 
Hellenes,  in  the  City-States  of  the  Greek  peninsula,  had  brought 
their  civilization  to  its  Golden  Age,  another  branch  of  the  great 
^ryan  race,  which  had  previously  settled  in  the  Itahan  peninsula, 
had  begun  the  creation  of  a  new  civilization  there  which  was 
destined  to  become  extended  and  powerful.    At  the  beginning  of 


.  The  Early  Peoples  or  Italy,  and  the  Extension  of  the 
Roman  Power 

In  509  B.C.  Attica  opened  her  citizenship  to  all  free  inhabitants,  and  half  a  century 
later  the  Golden  Age  of  Greece  was  in  full  swing.  By  338  B.C.  Greece's  glory  had 
departed.  Philip  of  Macedon  had  become  master,  and  its  political  freedom  was 
over.  By  264  B.C.  the  center  of  Greek  life  and  thought  had  been  transferred  to 
Alexandria,  and  Rome's  great  expansion  had  begun. 


EDUCATION  AND  WORK  OF  ROME 


29 


recorded  history  we  find  a  number  of  tribes  of  this  branch  of  the 
Aryan  race  settled  in  different  parts  of  Italy,  as  is  shown  in  Fig- 
ure 7.  Slowly,  but  gradually,  the  smallest  of  these  divisions,  the 
Latins,  extended  its  rule  over  the  other  tribes,  and  finally  over 
the  Greek  settlements  to  the  south  and  the  Gauls  to  the  north,  so 
that  by  201  B.C.  the  entire  Italian  peninsula  had  become  subject 
to  the  City-State  government  at  Rome. 

(  By  a  wise  policy  of  tolerance,  patience,  concihation,  and  assim- 
ilation the  Latins  gradually  became  the  masters  of  all  Italy^  Un- 
like the  Greek  City-States,  vRome  seemed  to  possess  a  natural 
genius  for  the  art  of  government.)  Upon  the  people  she  con- 
quered she  bestowed  the  great  gift  of  Roman  citizenship,  and  she 
attached  them  to  her  by  granting  local  government  to  their  towns 
and  by  interfering  as  little  as 
possible  with  their  local  manners, 
speech,  habits,  and  institutions. 
By  founding  colonies  among  them 
and  by  building  excellent  military 
roads  to  them,  she  insured  her 
rule,  and  by  kindly  and  generous 
treatment  she  bound  the  different 
Italian  peoples  ever  closer  and 
closer  to  the  central  government  at 
Rome.  By  a  most  wonderful  un- 
derstanding of  the  psychology  of 
other  peoples,  new  in  the  world 
before  the  work  of  Rome,  and  not 

seen  again  until  the  work  of  the  English  in  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury, Rome  gradually  assimilated  the  peoples  of  the  Italian 
peninsula  and  in  time  amalgamated  them  into  a  single  Roman 
race.  In  speech,  customs,  manners,  and  finally  in  blood  she 
Romanized  the  different  tribes  and  brought  them  under  her 
leadership.  Later  this  same  process  was  extended  to  Spain,  GrfUl, 
and  even  to  far-off  Britain. 

The  great  mission  of  Rome.  Had  Rome  tried  to  impose  her 
rule  and  her  ways  and  her  mode  of  thought  on  her  subject  people, 
and  to  reduce  them  to  complete  subjection  to  her,  as  the  modern 
German  and  Austrian  Empires,  for  example,  tried  to  do  with  the 
peoples  who  came  under  their  controlj^he  Roman  Empire  could 
never  have  been  created,  and  what  would  have  saved  civilization 
from  complete  destruction  during  the  period  of  the  barbarian 


Fig.  8 
The  Principal  Roman  Roads 


30  A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

invasions  is  hard  to  see.  Instead,  Rome  treated  her  subjects  as 
her  friends,  and  not  as  conquered  peoples;  led  them  to  see  that 
their  interests  were  identical  with  hers ;  gave  them  large  local  inde- 
pendence and  freedom  in  government,  under  her  strong  control 
of  general  affairs ;  opened  up  her  citizenship  and  the  line  of  pro- 
motion in  the  State  to  her  provincials;  and  won  them  to  the 
peace  and  good  order  which  she  everywhere  imposed  by  the  ad- 
vantages she  offered  through  a  common  language,  common  law, 
common  coinage,  common  commercial  arrangements,  common 
state  service,  and  the  common  treatment  of  all  citizens  of  every 
race.  In  consequence,  the  provincial  was  willingly  absorbed  into 
the  common  Roman  race  —  absorbed  in  dress,  manners,  religion, 
political  and  legal  institutions,  family  names,  and,  most  impor- 
tant of  all,  in  language. 

II.  THE  PERIOD  OF  HOME  EDUCATION 

The  early  Romans  and  their  training.  In  the  early  history  of 
the  Romans  there  were  no  schools,  and  it  was  not  until  about 
r  300  B.C.  that  even  primary  schools  began  to  develop^  What  edu- 
cation was  needed  was  imparted  in  the  home  or  in  the  field  and  in 
the  camp,  and  was  of  a  very  simple  type.  Certain  virtues  were 
demanded  —^modesty,  firmness,  prudence,  piety,  courage,  seri- 
ousness, and  regard  for  duty  —  and  these  were  instilled  both  by 
precept  and  example.  Each  home  was  a  center  of  the  reHgious 
life,  and  of  civic  virtue  and  authority.  In  it  the  father  was  a  high 
priest,  with  power  of  life  and  death  over  wife  and  children.  He 
alone  conversed  with  the  gods  and  prepared  the  sacrifices.  The 
wife  and  mother,  however,  held  a  high  place  in  the  home  and  in 
the  training  of  the  children,  the  marriage  tie  being  regarded  as 
very  sacred.  She  also  occupied  a  respected  position  in  society, 
and  was  complete  mistress  of  the  house  (R.  17). 

The  father  trained  the  son  for  the  practical  duties  of  a  man 
anW  a  citizen ;  the  mother  trained  the  daughter  to  become  a  good 
housekeeper,  wife,  and  mother.  Morality,  character,  obedience 
to  parents  and  to  the  State,  and  whole-hearted  service  were  em- 
phasized. The  boy's  father  taught  him  to  read,  write,  and  count. 
Stories  of  those  who  had  done  great  deeds  for  the  State  were  told, 
and  martial  songs  were  learned  and  sung.  After  450  bx.  every 
boy  had  to  learn  th^  Laws  of  the  Twelve  Tables  (R.  12)]  and  be 
able  to  explain  their  meaning  (R.  13).  As  the  boy  grew  older 
he  followed  his  father  in  the  fields  and  in  the  public  place  and  lis- 
tened to  the  conversation  of  men. 


EDUCATION  AND  WORK  OF  ROME         31 

Education  by  doing.  It  was  largely  an  education  by  doing,  as 
was  that  of  the  old  Greek  period,  though  entirely  different  in 
character.  Either  by  apprenticeship  to  the  soldier,  farmer,  or 
statesman,  or  by  participation  in  the  activities  of  a  citizen,  was 
the  training  needed  imparted,  ^ts  purpose  was  to  produce  good 
fathers,  citizens,  and  soldiers.^  Its  ideals  were  found  in  the  real 
and  practical  needs  of  a  small  State,  where  the  ability  to  care  for 
one's  s^  was  a  necessary  virtue.'  To  be  healthy  and  strong,  to 
reverence  the  gods  and  the  institutions  of  the  State,  to  obey  his 
parents  and  the  laws,  to  be  proud  of  his  family  connections  and  his 
ancestors,  to  be  brave  and  efficient  in  war,  to  know  how  to  farm 
or  to  manage  a  business,  were  the  aims  and  ends  of  this  early  train^ 
ing.  It  produced  a  nation  of  citizens  who  willingly  subordinated 
themselves  to  the  interests  of  the  State,  a  nation  of  warriors  who 
brought  all  Italy  under  their  rule,  a  calculating,  practical  people 
who  believed  themselves  destined  to  become  the  conquerors  and 
rulers  of  the  world,  and  a  reserved  and  proud  race,  trained  to 
govern  and  to  do  business,  but  not  possessed  of  lofty  ideals  or 
large  enthusiasms  in  life  (Rs.  15,  16). 

III.  THE  TRANSITION  TO  SCHOOL  EDUCATION 

Beginnings  of  school  education.  Up  to  about  300  B.C.  educa- 
tion had  been  entirely  in  the  home,  and  in  the  activities  of  the 
fields  and  the  State!)  It  was  a  period  of  personal  valor  and  stern 
civic  virtue,  in  a  rather  primitive  type  of  society,  as  yet  but  little  in 
contact  with  the  outside  world,  and  little  need  of  any  other  type 
of  training  had  been  felt.  /Up  to  about  250  B.C.,  at  least,  Roman 
education  remained  substantially  as  it  had  been  in  the  preceding 
centuries.  J  Reading,  writing,  declamation,  chanting,  and  the 
Laws  of  the  Twelve  Tables  still  constituted  the  subject-matter  of 
instruction,  and  the  old  virtues  continued  to  be  emphasized. 

By  the  middle  of  the  third  century  B.C.  Rome  had  expanded  its 
rule  to  include  nearly  all  the  Italian  peninsula  (see  Figure  7), 
and  was  transforming  itself  politically  from  a  little  rural  City- 
State  into  an  Empire,  with  large  world  relationships.  A  knowl- 
edge of  Greek  now  came  to  be  demanded  both  for  diplomatic  and 
for  business  reasons,  and  the  need  of  a  larger  culture,  to  corre- 
spond with  the  increased  importance  of  the  State,  began  to  be  felt 
by  the  wealthier  and  better-educated  classes.  Greek  scholars, 
brought  in  as  captured  slaves  from  the  Greek  colonies  of  southern 
Italy,  soon  began  to  be  extensively  employed  as  teachers  and  as 
secretaries. 


32  A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


( 


About  233  B.C.,  Livius  Andronicus,  who  had  been  brought  to 
Rome  as  a  slave  when  Tarentum,  one  of  the  Greek  cities  of  south- 
ern Italy,  was  captured,  and  who  later  had  obtained  his  freedom, 
made  a  translation  of  the  Odyssey^  into  Latin,  and  became  a  teacher 
of  Latin  and  Greek  at  itome.  This  had  a  wonderful  effect  in 
developing  schools  and  a  literary  atmosphere  at  Rome^  The 
Odyssey  at  once  became  the  great  school  textbook,  in  time  sup- 
planting the  Twelve  Tables,  and  literary  and  school  education 
now  rapidly  developed.  The  Latin  language  became  crystallized 
in  form,  and  other  Greek  works  were  soon  translated.  The  be- 
ginnings of  a  native  Latin  literature  were  now  made.  Greek 
higher  schools  were  opened,  many  Greek  teachers  and  slaves 
offered  instruction,  and  the  Hellenic  scheme  of  culture,  as  it  had 
previously  developed  in  Attica,  soon  became  the  fashion  at  Rome. 

Changes  in  national  ideals.  The  second  century  B.C.  was  even 
more  a  period  of  rapid  change  in  all  phases  and  aspects  of  Roman 
life.  During  this  century  Rome  became  a  great  world  empire, 
and  mistress  of  the  whole  Mediterranean  world.  Her  ships 
plied  the  seas,  her  armies  and  governors  ruled  the  land.  The 
introduction  of  wealth,  luxuries,  and  slaves  from  the  new  prov- 
inces, which  followed  their  capture,  soon  had  a  very  demoralizing 
influence  upon  the  people.  Private  and  public  religion  and  moral- 
ity rapidly  declined;  religion  came  to  be  an  empty  ceremonial; 
divorce  became  common;  wealth  and  influence  ruled  the  State; 
slaves  became  very  cheap  and  abundant,  and  were  used  for  almost 
every  type  of  service.  From  a  land  of  farmers  of  small  farms, 
sturdy  and  self-supporting,  who  lived  simply,  reared  large  fam- 
ilies, feared  the  gods,  respected  the  State,  and  made  an  honest 
living,  it  became  a  land  of  great  estates  and  wealthy  men,  and 
the  self-respecting  peasantry  were  transformed  into  soldiers  for 
foreign  wars,  or  joined  the  rabble  in  the  streets  of  Rome.  (^Wealth 
became  the  great  desideratum,  and  the  great  avenue  to  this  was 
through  the  public  service,  either  as  army  commanders  and  gov- 
ernors, or  as  public  men  who  could  sway  the  multitude  and  com- 
mand votes  and  influence!)  Manifestly  the  old  type  of  education 
was  not  intended  to  meet  such  needs,  and  now  in  Rome,  as  pre- 
viously in  Athens,  a  complete  transformation  in  the  system  of 
training  for  the  young  took  place.*|' 

The  Hellenization  of  Rome.  The  result  was  the  Hellenization 
of  the  intellectual  life  of  Rome,  making  complete  the  Helleniza- 
tion of  the  Mediterranean  world.    After  the  fall  of  Greece,  in  146 


EDUCATION  AND  WORK  OF  ROME 


33 


B.C.,  a  great  influx  of  educated  Greeks  took  place.  CSo  completely 
did  the  Greek  educational  system  seem  to  meet  the  needs  of  the 
changed  Roman  State  that  at  first  the  Greek  schools  were  adopted 
bodily  —  Greek  language,  pedagogue,  higher  schools  of  rhetoric 
and  philosophy,  and  all  —  and  the  schools  were  in  reality  Greek 
schools  but  shghtly  modified  to  meet  the  needs  of  Rome.  Gytfir- 
nasia  were  erected,  and  wealthy  Romans,  as  well  as  youths,  began 
to  spend  their  leisure  in  studying  Greek  and  in  trying  to  learn 
gymnastic  exercises. 

In  time  the  national  pride  and  practical  sense  of  the  Romans 
led  them  to  open  so-called  "culture  schools"  of  their  own,  mod- 
eled after  the  Greek.  ^  The  Latin  language  then  replaced  the 
Greek  as  the  vehicle  of  instruction,  though  Greek  was  still  studied 
extensively,  and  Rome  began  the  development  of  a  system  of 
private-school  instruction  possessing  some  elements  that  were 
native  to  Roman  Hf e  and  Roman  needs,  j 

IV.  THE  SCHOOL  SYSTEM  AS  FINALLY  ESTABLISHED 

The  ludus,  or  primary  school.  The  elementary  school,  known 
as  the  ludus,  or  ludus  literarum,  the  teacher  of  which  was  known 
as  a  ludi  magister,  was  the  beginning  or  primary  school  of  the 
scheme  as  finally  evolved.  This  corresponded  to  the  school  of 
the  Athenian  grammatist,  and  like  it  the  instruction  consisted  of 
reading,  writing,  and  counting.  These  schools  were  open  to  both 
sexes,  but  were  chiefly  frequented  by  boys.  They  were  entered 
at  the  age  of  seven,  sometimes  six,  and  covered  the  period  up 
to  twelve.  Reading  and 
writing  were  taught  by 
much  the  same  methods 
as  in  the  Greek  schools, 
and  approximately  the 
same  writing  materials 
were  used.  Something  of 
the  same  difficulty  was 
experienced  also  in  mas- 
tering the  reading  art 
(R.  22).  Writing  seems 
rather  to  have  followed 

reading,  and,  as  in  the  Greek  schools,  the  pupils  copied  down  from 
dictation  and  made  their  own  books  {dictata)  /  Literature  received 
no  such  emphasis  in  the  elementary  schools  of  Rome  as  in  those 


Fig.  9.  Roman  Writing-Materials 

Inkstand,  pen,  letter,  box  of  manuscripts,  wax 
tablets,  stylus. 


34 


A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


of  the  Greeks,  and  the  palcestra  of  the  Greeks  was  not  reproduced 
at  Rome. ) 

Due  in  part  to  the  practical  character  of  the  Roman  people, 
to  the  established  habit  of  keeping  careful  housghold  accounts, 
to  the  difficulties  of  their  system  of  calculation,  to  the  practice 
of  finger  reckoning,  and  to  the  vast  commercial  and  financial 
interests  that  the  Romans  formed  throughout  the  world  which 
they  conquered,  arithmetic  became  a  subject  of  fundamental 
importance  in  their  schools,  and  much  time  was  given  to  securing 
perfection  in  calculation  and  finger  reckoning.  Hence  it  occu- 
pied a  place  of  large  importance  in  the 
primary  school.  An  abacus  or  counting- 
board  was  used,  similar  to  the  one  shown 
in  Figure  lo,  and  Horace  mentions  a  bag 
of  stones  (calculi)  as  a  part  of  a  school- 
boy's equipment. 

The  ludi  magister.  The  Itidi  magister  at 
Rome  held  a  position  even  less  enviable 
than  that  held  by  the  grammatist  at 
Athens.  ''The  starveling  Greek,"  who 
was  glad  to  barter  his  knowledge  for  the 
certainty  of  a  good  dinner,  was  sneered  at 
by  many  Roman  writers.  Many  slaves 
were  engaged  in  this  type  of  instruction, 
bringing  in  fees  for  their  owners.  It  was 
not  regarded  as  of  importance  that  the 
teachers  of  these  schools  be  of  high  grade. 
uThe  establishment  of  and  attendance  at 
these  primary  schools  was  wholly  volun- 
tary, and  the  children  in  them  probably 
represented  but  a  small  percentage  of  those  of  school  age  in  the 
total  population/)  These  schools  became  quite  common  in  the 
Italian  cities,  ana  in  time  were  found  in  the  provincial  cities  of  the 
Empire  as  well.\T^ey  remained,  however,  entirely  private-adven- 
ture undertakings  A  the  State  doing  nothing  toward  encouraging 
their  establishment,  supervising  the  instruction  in  them,  or 
requiring  attendance  at  them. 

The  schools  were  held  anywhere  —  in  a  portico,  in  a  shed  or 
booth  in  front  of  a  house,  in  a  store,  or  in  a  recessed  comer  shut 
in  by  curtains.  A  chair  for  the  master,  benches  for  the  pupils, 
an  outer  room  for  cloaks  and  for  the  pedagogues  to  wait  in,  and 


• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

M 

C 

X 

I 

c 

X 

1 

• 

• 
• 

• 

• 
• 

• 

• 

• 

• 
• 
• 

• 

• 
• 
• 

• 
• 

• 
• 

• 
• 
• 
• 

• 

• 
• 

• 

Fig.  io.  A  Roman 

COUNTING-B  O  ARD 

Pebbles  were  used,  those 
nearest  the  numbered  di- 
viding partition  being 
counted.  Each  pebble  above 
when  moved  downward 
counted  five  of  those  in  the 
same  division  below.  The 
board  now  shows  8,760,254. 


EDUCATION  AND  WORK  OF  ROME         35 

a  bundle  of  rods  {ferula)  constituted  the  necessary  equipment. 
The  pupils  brought  with  them  boxes  containing  writing-materials, 
book-rolls,  and  reckoning-stones.  Schools  began  early  in  the 
morning,  pupils  in  winter  going  with  lanterns  to  their  tasks. 
There  was  much  flogging  of  children,  and  in  Martial  we  find 
an  angry  epigram  which  he  addressed  to  a  schoolmaster  who  dis- 
turbed his  sleep  (R.  22  a) . . 

The  secondary  schools,  (^econdary  or  Latin  grammar  schools, 
under  a  grammaticus,  and  covering  instruction  from  the  age  of 
twelve  to  sixteen,  had  become  clearly  differentiated  from  the 
primary  schools  under  a  ludi  magister  by  the  time  of  the  death  of 
Cato,  148  B.cN  At  first  this  higher  instruction  began  in  the  form 
of  private  tutors,  probably  in  the  homes  of  the  wealthy,  and 
Greek  was  the  language  taught.  By  the  beginning  of  the  first 
century  B.C.,  however,  Latin  secondary  schools  began  to  arise, 
and  in  time  these  too  spread  to  all  the  important  cities  of  the 
Empire,  f  Attendance  at  them  was  wholly  voluntary,  and  was 
confined  entirely  to  the  children  of  the  well-to-do  classes^  The 
teachers  were  Greeks,  or  Latins  who  had  been  trained  by  the 
Greeks.  CEach  teacher  taught  as  he  wished,  but  the  schools 
throughout  the  Empire  came  to  be  much  the  same  in  character^ 
The  course  of  study  consisted  chiefly  of  instruction  in  grammar 
and  literature,  the  purpose  being  to  secure  such  a  mastery  of  the 
Latin  language  and  Greek  and  Latin  literatures  as  might  be  most 
helpful  in  giving  that  broader  culture  now  recognized  as  the  mark 
of  an  educated  man,  anqin  preparing  the  young  Roman  to  take 
up  the  life  of  an  orator  and  public  oifidal  (R.  24)^  Grammar, 
composition,  elocution,  ethics,  history,  mythology,  and  geography 
were  all  comprehended  in  the  instruction  in  grammar  and  litera- 
ture in  the  secondary  schools.  \A  little  music  was  added  at  times, 
to  help  the  pupil  intone  his  reading  and  declamation.^^ A  little 
geometry  and  astronomy  were  also  included,  for  their  practical 
applications.]  The  athletic  exercises  of  the  Greeks  were  rejected, 
as  contributmg  to  immorality  and  being  a  waste  of  time  and 
strength.  In  a  sense  these  schools  were  finishing  schools  for 
Roman  youths  who  went  to  any  school  at  all,  much  as  are  our 
high  schools  of  to-day  for  the  great  bulk  of  American  children. 
j  The  schools  were  better  housed  than  those  of  the  ludij^nd  the 
*-  masters  were  of  a  better  quality  and  received  larger  f eesi  Like 
the  elementary  schools,  the  State  exercised  no  supervision  or  con- 
trol over  these  schools  or  the  teachers  or  pupils  in  them. ) 


36         A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

The  schools  of  rhetoric.  Up  to  this  point  the  schools  estab- 
Hshed  had  been  for  practical  and  useful  information  (the  primary 
schools)  or  cultural  (the  grammar  or  secondary  schools) .  \)n  top 
of  these  a  higher  and  professional  type  of  school  was  next  devel- 
oped, to  train  youths  in  rhetoric  and  oratory^ preparatory  to  the 
great  professions  of  law  and  public  life  at  Rome)  These  schools 
were  direct  descendants  of  the  Greek  rhetorical  schools,  which 
evolved  from  the  schools  of  the  Sophists. 
I  These  schools,  the  teachers  of  which  were  known  as  rhetors,  fur- 
nished a  type  of  education  representing  a  sort  of  collegiate  educa- 
tion for  the  period.  ^  They  were  oratorical  in  purpose,  because  the 
orator  had  becorrie  the  RorpLaix. ideal  of  a  well-educated  man 
(R.  24) .  During  the  life  of  the  Republic  the  orator  found  many 
opportunities  for  the  constructive  use  of  his  ability,  and  all 
young  men  ambitious  to  enter  law  or  politics  found  the  training 
of  these  schools  a,5^gessary  prerequisite.  They  were  attended 
for  two  or  three  years  by  boys  over  sixteen,  but  only  the  wealthier 
and  more  aristocratic  families  could  afford  to  send  their  boys  to 
them.  ~ 

University  learning.  Roman  youths  desiring  still  further 
training  could  now  journey  to  the  eastward  and  attend  the  Greek 
universities.  A  few  did  so,  much  as  American  students  in  the 
middle  of  the  nineteenth  century  went  to  Germany  for  higher 
study.  Athens  and  Rhodes  were  most  favored.  Brutus,  Horace, 
and  Cicero,  among  others,  studied  at  Athens;  Caesar,  Cicero,  and 
Cassius  at  Rhodes.  Later  Alexandria  was  in  favor.  In  a  library 
founded  in  the  Temple  of  Peace  by  Vespasian  (ruled  69  to  79  a.d.) 
the  University  at  Rome  had  its  origin,  and  in  time  this  developed 
into  an  institution  with  professors  in  law,  medicine,  arfchitecture, 
mathematics  and  mechanics,  and  gramjnar  and  rhetoric  in  both 
the  Latin  and  Greek  languages.  In  this  many  youths  from  pro- 
vincial cities  came  to  Study.  The  hnes  of  instruction  represented 
nothing,  however,  in  the  way  of  scientific  investigation  or  creative 
thought;  the  instruction  was  formal  and  dogmatic,  being  largely 
a  further  elaboration  of  what  had  previously  been  well  done  by.the 
Greeks. 

Nature  of  the  educational  system  developed.  Such  was  the 
educational  system  which  was  finally  evolved  to  meet  the  new 
cultural  needs  of  the  Roman  Empire.  (  In  all  its  foundation  ele- 
ments it  was  Greek.  1  Having  borrowed  —  conquered  one  might 
almost  say  —  Greek 4-eligion,  philosophy,  literature,  and  learning, 


EDUCATION  AND  WORK  OF  ROME 


37 


s 

>. 

(Greek 

Law 

1 
1 

Universities) 

University  of 

Rome 
(Professor) 

Medicine 

Architecture 

Mathematics 

Grammar 

Rhetoric 

» 

« 

Schools  of 

Grammar 

9> 

« 

Rhetoric 

Rhetoric 
Dialectic 

a 

(Rhetor) 

Law 

e 

t 

a 
•a 

Latin 

Grammar  and 

s 

8 

Schoola 

Literatura 

(Grammaticas) 

Ludi,  or 

1 

0 

Primary 

0 

Schools 

Reading 
Writing 

ce 

M 

(Ludi  ntSK^ster) 

Reckonine 

the  Romans  naturally  borrowed  also  the  school  system  that  had 
been  evolved  to  impart  this  culture^Never  before  or  since  has  any 
people  adapted  so  completely 
to  their  own  needs  the  system 
of  educational  training  evolved 
by  another^  To  the  Greek 
basis  some  distinctively  Ro- 
man elements  were  added  to 
adapt  it  better  to  the  peculiar 
needs  of  their  own  people, 
while  on  the  other  hand  many 
of  the  finer  Greek  character- 
istics were  omitted  entirely. 
Having  once  adopted  the 
Greek  plan,  the  constructive 
Roman  mind  organized  it  into 
a  system  superior  to  the  orig- 
inal, but  in  so  doing  formal- 
ized it  more  than  the  Greeks 
had  ever  done  (R.  19).  ) 
(^  The  schools  reached  but  a 
small,  selected  class  of  youths, 
trained  for  only  the  political 
careeri  and  cannot  be  consid- 
ered as  having  been  general  or  as  having  educated  any  more  than 
a  small  percentage  of  the  future  citizens  of  the  State^  Many  of 
the  important  lines  of  activity  in  which  the  Romans  engaged,  and 
which  to-day  are  regarded  as  monuments  to  their  constructive 
skill  and  practical  genius,  such  as  architectural  achiev^nents, 
the  building  of  roads  and  aqueducts,  the  many  skilled  trades,  and 
the  large  commercial  undertakings,  these  schools  did  nothing  to 
prepare  youths  fori  The  State,  unlike  Athens,  never  required 
education  of  any  one,  did  not  make  what  was  offered  a  prepara- 
tion for  citizenship,  and  made  no  attempt  to  regulate  either 
teachers  or  instruction  until  late  in  the  history  of  the  Empire^?- 
Education  at  Rome  was  from  the  first  purely  a  private-adventure 
affair,  most  nearly  analogous  with  us  to  instruction  in  music  and 
dancing.  \Those  who  found  the  education  offered  of  any  value 
could  take  it  and  pay  for  it;  those  who  did  not  could  let  it  alone  J 
A  few  did  the  former,  the  great  mass  of  the  Romans  the  latter. 
For  the  great  slave  class  that  developed  at  Rome  there  was,  of 
course,  no  education  at  all. 


Fig.  II.   The  Roman  Voluntary 
Educational  System,  as  finally 

EVOLVED 


38         A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

Results  on  Roman  life  and  government.  Still,  out  of  this  pri- 
vate and  tuition  system  of  schools  many  capable  political  leaders 
and  executives  came  —  men  who  exercised  great  influence  on  the 
history  of  the  State,  fought  out  her  political  battlesKorganized 
and  directed  her  government  at  home  and  in  the  provinces,  and 
helped  build  up  that  great  scheme  of  government  and  law  and 
order  which  was  Rome's  most  significant  contribution  to  future 
civilization^  It  was  in  this  direction,  and  in  practical  and  con- 
structive work  along  engineering  and  architectural  lines,  that 
Rome  excelled.  The  Roman  genius  for  government  and  law  and 
order  and  constructive  undertakings  must  be  classed,  in  impor- 
tance for  the  future  of  civilization  in  the  world,  along  with  the 
ability  of  Greece  in  literature  and  philosophy  and  art. 

The  conquest  of  the  known  world  by  this  practical  and  con- 
structive people  could  not  have  otherwise  than  decisively  in- 
fluenced the  whole  course  of  human  history,  and,  coming  at  the 
time  in  world  affairs  that  it  did,  the  influence  on  all  future  civiliza- 
tion of  the  work  of  Rome  has  been  profound^  The  great  political 
fact  which  dominated  all  the  Middle  Ages,  and  shaped  the  religion 
and  government  and  civilization  of  the  time,  was  the  fact  that  the 
Roman  Empire  had  been  and  had  done  its  work  so  well. 

/y       V.  ROME'S  CONTRIBUTION  TO  CIVILIZATION 

Greece  and  Rome  contrasted.  The  contrast  between  the 
Greeks  and  the  Romans  is  marked  in  almost  every  particular. 
The  Greeks  were  an  imaginative,  subjective,  artistic,  and  idealistic 
people,  with  little  administrative  ability  and  few  practical  ten- 
dencies. jvHie  Romans,  on  the  other  hand,  were  an  unimagina- 
tive, concrete,  practical,  and  constructive  nation.]  Greece  made 
its  great  contribution  to  world  civilization\Jn  literature  and  phil- 
osophy and  artnRome  in  law  and  order  and  government.  The 
Greeks  lived  aiife  of  aesthetic  enjoyment  of  the  beautiful  in  nature 
and  art,  and  their  basis  for  estimating  the  worth  of  a  thing  was 
intellectual  and  artistic;  to  the  Romans  the  aesthetic  and  the 
beautiful  made  little  appeal,  and  their  basis  for  estimating  the 
worth  of  a  thing  was  utilitarian.  The  Greeks  worshiped  "the 
beautiful  and  the  good,"  and  tried  to  enjoy  life  rationally  and 
nobly,  while  the  Romans  worshiped  force  and  effectiveness,  and 
lived  by  rule  and  authority^  The  Greeks  thought  in  personal 
terms  of  government  and  virtue  and  happiness,  while  the  Romans 
thought  in  general  terms  of  law  and  duty,  and  their  happiness 


EDUCATION  AND  WORK  OF  ROME  39 

was  rather  in  present  denial  for  future  gain  than  in  any  immediate 
enjoyment.J 

As  a  result  the  Romans  developed  no  great  scholarly  or  literary 
atmosphere,  as  the  Greeks  had  done  at  Athens.  They  built  up 
no  great  speculative  philosophies,  and  framed  no  great  theories 
of  government.  Even  their  literature  was,  in  part,  an  imitation 
of  the  Greek,  though  possessing  many  elements  of  native  strength 
and  beauty.  /They  were  a  people  who  knew  how  to  accomplish 
results  rather  than  to  speculate  about  means  and  ends^  Useful- 
ness and  effectiveness  were  with  them  the  criteria  of  the  worth  of 
any  idea  or  project.^  They  subdued  and  annexed  an  empire,  they 
gave  law  and  order  to  a  primitive  world]  they  civilized  and  Roman- 
ized barbarian  tribes,  they  built  roads  connecting  all  parts  of  their 
Empire  that  were  the  best  the  world  had  ever  knownj)their  aque- 
ducts and  bridges  were  wonders  of  engineering  skiU)  their  public 
buildings  and  monuments  still  excite  admiration  and  envyj  in 
many  of  the  skilled  trades  they  developed  tools  and  processes  of 
large  future  usefulness,  and  their  agriculture  was  the  best  the 
world  had  known  up  to  that  time^They  were  strong  where  the 
Greeks  were  weak,  and  weak  where  the  Greeks  were  strongy 

By  reason  of  this  difference  the  two  peoples  supplemented  onie 
another  well  in  the  work  of  laying  the  foundations  upon  which 
our  modem  civilization  has  been  built.^  Greece  created  the 
intellectual  and  aesthetic  ideals  and  the  culture  for  our  life,  while 
Rome  developed  the  political  institutions  under  which  ideals  may 
be  realized  and  culture  may  be  enjoyed^  From  the  Greeks  and 
Hebrews  our  modern  life  has  drawn  its  great  inspirations  and  its 
ideals  for  life,  while  from  the  Romans  we  have  derived  our  ideals 
as  to  government  and  obedience  to  la^/;  One  may  say  that  the 
Romans  as  a  people  specialized  in  government,  law,  order,  and 
constructive  practical  undertakings,  and  bequeathed  to  posterity 
a  wonderful  inheritance  in  governmental  forms,  legal  codes,  com- 
mercial processes,  and  engineering  undertakings,  while  the  Greeks 
left  to  us  a  philosophy,  literature,  art,  and  a  world  culture  which 
the  civilized  world  will  never  cease  to  enjoy^.  The  Greeks  were  an 
imaginative,  impulsive,  and  a  joyous  peopl^  the  Romans  sedate, 
severe,  and  superior  to  the  Greeks  in  persistence  and  moral  force^ 
The  Greeks  were  ever  yoimg;  the  Romans  were  always  grown  and 
serious  men.) 

Rome's  great  contribution.  Rome's  great  contribution,  then, 
was  along  the  lines  just  indicated.     To  this,  the  school  system 


40         A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

which  became  established  in  the  Roman  State  contributed  only 
indirectly  and  but  littlej  The  unification  of  the  ancient  world 
into  one  Empire,  with  a  common  body  of  traditions,  practices, 
coinage,  speech,  and  law,  which  made  the  triumph  of  Christianity 
possible j)the  formulation  of  a  body  of  law  which  bar^^jian  tribes 
accepted,  which  was  studied  throughout  the  Middle  Ages,  which 
formed  the  basis  of  the  legal  system  of  the  mediaeval  Church,  and 
which  has  largely  influenced  modern  practical;  the  development 
of  a  language  from  which  many  modern  tongues  have  been  de- 
rived, and  which  has  modified  all  western  languages;  and  the 
perfection  of  an  alphabet  which  has  become  the  common  property 
of  all  nations  whose  civilization  has  been  derived  from  the  Greek 
and  Roman  —  these  constitute  the  chief  contributions  of  Rome 
to  modern  civilization^ 

Of  all  the  Roman  contributions  to  modern  civilization  perhaps 
the  one  that  most  completely  permeates  all  our  modern  life  is  their 
alphabet  and  speech.  This  alphabet  they  obtained  from  the 
Greek  colonies  in  southern  Italy,  and  the  Greeks  obtained  it  from 
the  still  earlier  Phoenicians.  It  has  become  the  common  prop- 
erty of  almost  all  the  civilized  world.  \  In  speech,  the  French, 
Spanish,  Portuguese,  and  Italian  tongues  go  back  directly  to  the 
Latin,  and  these  are  the  tongues  of  Mexico  and  South  America 
as  well.  The  English  language,  which  is  spoken  throughout  a 
large  part  of  the  civilized  world,  and  by  t^o-thirds  of  its  inhabit- 
ants, has  also  received  so  many  additions  from  Romanic  sources 
•that  we  to-day  scarcely  utter  a  sentence  without  using  some  word 
once  used  by  the  citizens  of  ancient  Rome^ 

Among  the  smaller  but  nevertheless  important  contributions 
which  we  owe  to  Rome,  and  which  were  passed  on  to  mediaeval 
v\  and  modern  Europe,  should  be  mentioned  certain  practical 
knowledge  in  agriculture  and  the  mechanic  arts;  many  inventions 
and  acquired  skills  in  the  arts  and  trades;  ^n  organized  sea  and 
land  trade  and  commerce^  cleared  and  improved  lands,  good 
houses,  roads  and  bridges;  great  architectural  and  engineering 
remains,  scattered  all  through  the  province^;  the  beginnings  of 
the  transformation  of  the  slave  into  the  serf,  from  which  the  great 
body  of  freemen  of  modern  Europe  later  were  evolved ;  and  certain 
educational  conceptions  and  practices  which  later  profoundly  in- 
fluenced educational  methods  and  procedure^  How  large  these 
contributions  were  we  shall  appreciate  better  as  we  proceed  with 
our  history. 


EDUCATION  AND  WORK  OF  ROME         41 

The  way  paved  for  Christianity.  Ijt  was  the  great  civilizing  and 
unifying  work  of  the  Roman  State  that  paved  the  way  for  the 
next  great  contribution  to  the  foundations  of  the  structure  of  our 
moderil  civihzation,' —  me  contribution  of  Christianity)  (^  Had 
Italy  never  been  consolidatedjlliad  the  barbarian  tribes  to  the 
north  never  been  conquered  and  Romanized;  mad  Spain  and 
Africa  and  the  eastern  Mediterranean  never  known  the  rule  of 
Romephad  the  Latin  language  never  become  the  speech  of  the 
then  civilized  peoplesXhad  Roman  armies  never  imposed  law  and 
order  throughout  an  unruly  worldji  had  Roman  governors  and 
courts  never  established  common  rights  and  security;  had  Roman 
municipal  government  never  come  to  be  the  common  type  in 
the  cities  of  the  provinces;  (^ad  Roman  schools  in  the  provincial 
cities  never  trained  tlj^  foreign  citizen  in  Roman  ways  and  to 
think  Roman  thoughtsyjiad  Rome  never  established  free  trade 
and  intercourse  throughout  her  Empirej  (had  Rome  never  devel- 
oped processes  and  skills  in  agriculture  and  the  creative  arts; 
had  there  been  no  Roman  roads  and  common  coinagji';  and  had 
Rome  not  done  dozens  of  other  important  things  to  unify  and 
civilize  Europe  and  reduce  it  to  law  and  order,  it  is  hard  to 
imagine  the  chaos  that  would  have  resulted  when  the  Empire 
gay^  way  to  the  barbarian  hordes  which  finally  overwhelmed 
itJiWhere  we  should  have  been  to-day  in  the  upward  march 
of  civilization,  without  the  work  of  Rome,  it  is  impossible 
to  say. 

QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

1.  Contrast  the  Romans  as  a  colonizing  power  with  the  modern  Germans. 
The  EngUsh.    The  French. 

2.  At  what  period  in  our  national  development  did  home  education  with 
us  occupy  substantially  the  same  place  as  it  did  in  Rome  before  300  B.C.? 
In  what  respects  was  the  education  given  boys  and  girls  similar?  Dif- 
ferent? 

3.  What  was  the  most  marked  advance  over  the  Greeks  in  the  early  Roman 
training? 

4.  Contrast  the  education  of  the  Athenian,  Spartan,  and  Roman  boy, 
during  the  early  period  in  each  State. 

5.  To  what  extent  does  early  Roman  education  indicate  the  importance  of 
the  parent  and  of  study  of  biography  in  the  education  of  the  young? 

6.  Was  the  change  in  character  of  the  education  of  Roman  youths,  after 
the  expansion  of  the  Roman  State  and  the  estabUshment  of  world  con- 
tacts, preventable,  or  was  it  a  necessary  evolution?  Why?  Have  we 
ever  experienced  similar  changes? 

7.  As  a  State  increases  in  importance  and  enlarges  its  world  contacts,  is  a 
correspondingly  longer  training  and  enlarged  culture  necessary  at  home? 

8.  What  idea  do  you  get  as  to  the  extent  to  which  the  Latinized  Odyssey 


^ 


42         A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

was  read  from  the  fact  that  the  Latin  language  was  crystallized  in  form 
shortly  after  the  translation  was  made? 
9.  What  does  the  rapid  adoption  of  the  Greek  educational  system,  and  the 
later  evolution  of  a  native  educational  system  out  of  it,  indicate  as  to 
the  nature  of  Roman  expansion? 

10.  Was  the  introduction  of  the  Greek  pedagogue  as  a  fashionable  adjunct 
natural?    Why? 

11.  Why  is  a  period  of  very  rapid  expansion  in  a  State  likely  to  be  demoraliz- 
ing? How  may  the  demoralization  incident  to  such  expansion  be  antici- 
pated and  minimized? 

12.  Why  does  the  coming  of  large  landed  estates  introduce  important  social 
problems?  Have  we  the  beginnings  of  a  social  problem  of  this  type? 
What  correctives  have  we  that  Rome  did  not  have?vX>AA4avc^  txX/ 

13.  State  the  economic  changes  which  hastened  the  introduction  of  a  new 
type  of  higher  training  at  Rome. 

14.  Was  the  Hellenization  of  Rome  which  ensued  a  good  thing?     Why? 

15.  How  do  you  account  for  Rome  not  developing  a  state  school  system  in 
the  period  of  great  national  need  and  change,  instead  of  leaving  the 
matter  to  private  initiative?  Do  you  understand  that  any  large  percent- 
age of  youths  in  the  Roman  State  ever  attended  any  school? 

16.  Why  do  older  people  usually  oppose  changes  in  school  work  manifestly 
needed  to  meet  changing  national  demands? 

17.  Compare  the  difficulties  met  with  in  learning  to  read  Greek  and  Latin. 
Either  and  English. 

18.  How  do  you  account  for  the  much  smaller  emphasis  on  literature  and 
music  in  the  elementary  instruction  at  Rome  than  at  Athens?  How  for 
the  much  larger  emphasis  on  formal  grammar  in  the  secondary  schools 
at  Rome? 

ig.  What  subjects  of  study  as  we  now  know  them  were  included  in  the 
Roman  study  of  grammar  and  rhetoric? 

20.  How  do  you  explain  the  greater  emphasis  placed  by  the  Romans  on 
secondary  education  than  on  elementary  education? 

21.  What  particular  Roman  need  did  the  higher  schools  of  oratory  and 
rhetoric  supply? 

22.  What  does  the  exclusive  devotion  of  these  schools  to  such  studies  indi- 
cate as  to  professional  opportunities  at  Rome? 

23.  How  do  you  account  for  the  continuance  of  these  schools  in  favor,  and 
for  the  aid  and  encouragement  they  received  from  the  later  Emperors, 
when  the  very  nature  of  the  Empire  in  large  part  destroyed  the  careers- 
for  which  they  trained? 

24.  Compare  Rome  and  the  United  States  in  their  attitudes  toward  foreign- 
born  peoples. 

SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  selections  are  repro- 
duced : 

12.  The  Laws  of  the  Twelve  Tables. 

13.  Cicero:  Importance  of  the  Twelve  Tables  in  Education. 

14.  Schreiber:  A  Roman  Farmer's  Calendar. 

15.  Polybius:  The  Roman  Character. 

16.  Mommsen:  The  Grave  and  Severe  Character  of  the  Earlier  Romans. 

17.  Epitaph:  The  Education  of  Girls. 

18.  Marcus  Aurelius:  The  Old  Roman  Education  described. 

19.  Tacitus:  The  Old  and  the  New  Education  contrasted. 


EDUCATION  AND  WORK  OF  ROME    43 

30.  Suetonius:  Attempts  to  Prohibit  the  Introduction  of  Greek  Higher 
Learning. 

(a)  Decree  of  the  Roman  Senate,  161  B.C. 

(b)  Decree  of  the  Censor,  92  B.C. 

21.  Vergil:  Difficulty  experienced  in  Learning  to  Read. 

22.  Horace:  The  Education  given  by  a  Father. 

23.  Martial:  The  Ludi  Magister. 

(a)  To  the  Master  of  a  Noisy  School. 

(b)  To  a  Schoolmaster. 

24.  Cicero :  Oratory  the  Aim  of  Education. 

25.  Quintilian:  On  Oratory. 

26.  Constantine:  Privileges  granted  to  Physicians  and  Teachers. 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

Abb»tt,  F.  F.     Society  and  Politics  in  Ancient  Rome. 

*  Adams,  G.  B.     Civilization  during  the  Middle  Ages. 

Anderson,  L.  F.     "Some  Facts  regarding  Vocational  Education  among 
the  Greeks  and  Romans";  in  School  Review,  vol.  20,  pp.  191-201. 

*  Clarke,  Geo.    Education  of  Children  at  Rome. 

*  Dill,  Sam'l.    Roman  Society  in  the  Last  Century  of  the  Western  Empire. 

*  Laurie,  S.  S.    Historical  Survey  of  Pre-Christian  Education. 
Mahaffy,  J.  P.     The  Silver  Age  of  the  Greek  World. 

Ross,  W.  F.     "The  Strength  and  Weakness  of  Roman  Education";  in 

School  and  Society,  vol.  6,  pp.  457-63. 
Sandys,  J.  E.     History  of  Classical  Scholarship,  vol.  i. 
Thorndike,  Lynn.     History  of  Mediceval  Europe. 
Westermann,  W.  L.    Vocational  Training  in  Antiquity;  in  School  Review, 

vol.  22,  pp.  601-10. 


CHAPTER  IV 
THE  RISE  AND  CONTRIBUTION  OF  CHRISTIANITY 
.THE  RISE  AND  VICTORY  OF  CHRISTIANITY 

Religions  in  the  Roman  world.  As  was  stated  in  the  preceding 
chapter  (p.  30),  the  Roman  state  religion  was  an  outgrowth  of 
the  religion  of  the  home.  I  Just  as  there  had  been  a  number  of 
fireside  deities,  who  were  supposed  to  preside  over  the  different 
activities  of  the  home,  so  there  were  many  state  deities  who  were 
supposed  to  preside  over  the  different  activities  of  the  State. j  In 
addition,  the  Romans  exhibited  toward  the  religions  of  all  other 
peoples  that  same  tolerance  and  willingness  to  borrow  which  they 
exhibited  in  so  many  other  matters.  \  Certain  Greek  deities  were 
taken  over  and  temples  erected  to  them  in  Rome,  and  new  deities,  ~ 
to  guard  over  such  functions  as  health,  fortune,  peace,  concord, 
sowing,  reaping,  etc.,  were  established ."^  Extreme  tolerance  also 
was  shown  toward  the  special  religions  of  other  peoples  who  had 
been  brought  within  the  Empire,  and  certain  oriental  divinities 
had  even  been  admitted  and  given  their  place  in  Rome/) 

Like  many  other  features  of  Roman  life,  their  religion  was 
essentially  of  a  practical  nature,  dealing  with  the  affairs  of  every- 
day life,  and  having  little  or  no  relation  to  personal  morality^ 
It  promised  no  rewards  or  punishments  or  hopes  for  a  future  life, 
but  rather,  by  uniting  all  citizens  in  a  common  reverence  and  fear 
of  certain  deities,  helped  to  unify  the  Empire  and  hold  it  together. 
After  the  death  of  Augustus  (14  a.d.),  the  Roman  Senate  deified 
the  Emperor  and  enrolled  his  name  among  the  gods,  and  Emperor 
worship  was  added  to  their  ceremonies/.  This  naturally  spread 
rapidly  throughout  the  Empire,  tended  to  unite  all  classes  in 
allegiance  to.  the  central  government  at  Rome,  and  seemed  to  form 
the  basis  for  a  universal  religion  for  a  universal  empir^f' 

Feeling  of  need  for  something  more.  As  an  educated  class 
arose  in  Rome,  this  mixture  of  diverse  divinities  failed  to  satisfy; 
the  Roman  religion,  made  up  as  it  was  of  state  and  parental  duties 
and  precautions,  lost  with  them  its  force;  and  the  religious  cere- 
monies of  the  home  and  the  State  lost  for  them  their  meaningT^ 
The  mechanical  repetition  of  prayers  and  sacrifices  made  no 
appeal  to  the  emotions  or  to  the  moral  nature  of  individuals,  and 


CONTRIBUTION  OF  CHRISTIANITY         45 

ofiFered  no  spiritual  Joy  or  consolation  as  to  a  life  beyond.  CThe 
educated  Greeks  before  had  had  this  same  feeling,  and  had  in- 
dulged in  much  speculation  as  to  the  moral  nature  of  maji^  Many 
educated  Romans  now  turned  to  the  Greek  philosophers  for  some 
more  philosophical  explanation  of  the  great  mystery  of  life  and 
death.  ; 

V 

Where  this  new  religion  arose.  Far  to  the  eastern  end  of  the 
Mediterranean  there  had  long  lived  a  branch  of  the  "^prnitjc  race, 
which  had  developed  a  national  character  and  made  a  contribu- 
tion of  first  importance  to  the  religious  thought  of  the  world. 
(^  These  were  the  Hebrew  people  who,  leaving  Egypt  about  1500 
B.C.,  in  the  Exodus,  had  come  to  inhabit  the  land  of  Canaan, 
south  of  Phoenicia  and  east  and  north  of  Egypt.  )  From  a  wander- 
ing, pastoral  people  they  had  gradually  changed  to  a  settled, 
agricultural  people,  and  had  begun  the  development  of  a  regular 
State.  ^Unwilling,  however,  to  bear  the  burdens  of  a  political 
State,  and  objecting  to  taxation,  a  standing  army,  and  forced 
labor  for  the  State,  the  nationaHty  which  promised  at  one  time 
fell  to  pieces,  and  the  land  was  overrun  by  hostile  neighbors  and 
the  people  put  under  the  yoke?)  After  a  sad  and  tempestuous 
history,  which  culminated  in  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem  by  the 
Romans  in  70  a.d.,  the  inhabitants  were  sold  into  slavery  and 
dispersed  throughout  the  Roman  EmpireA 

These  people  developed  no  great  State,  and  made  no  contribu- 
tions to  government  or  science  or  art.  Their  contribution  was 
along  religious  Unes,  and  so  magnificent  and  uplifting  is  their 
religious  Hterature  that  it  is  certain  to  last  for  all  time.J  Alone 
among  all  eastern  people  they  early  evolved  the  idea  of  one 
omnipotent  God.")  The  religion  that  they  developed  declared 
man  to  be  the  child  of  God,  erected  personal  morality  and  service 
to  God  as  the  rule  of  life,  and  asserted  a  life  beyond  the  grave. 
It  was  about  these  ideas  that  the  whole  energy  of  the  people 
concentrated,  and  religion  became  the  central  thought  of  their 
lives  J  This  religion,  unUke  the  other  religions  of  the  Mediter- 
ranean world,  emphasized  duty  to  God,  service,  personal  moral- 
ity, chastity,  honesty,  and  truth  as  its  essential  elements.  The 
Law  of  Moses  became  the  law  of  the  land.  Woman  was  elevated 
to  a  new  place  in  the  life  of  the  ancient  world.  Children  became 
sacred  in  the  eyes  of  the  people.  iQieir  literary  contribution,  the 
Old  Testament  —  written  by  a  series  of  pajjiafchs,  lawgivers, 
prophets,  and  priests  —  pictures,  often  in  sublime  language,  the 


46         A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

various  migrations,  deliverances,  calamities,  religious  hopes,  aspi- 
rations, and  experiences  of  this  Chosen  Peopled 
\\  The  unity  of  this  people.  Just  before  their  country  was  over- 
run and  they  were  carried  captive  to  Babylon,  in  588  B.cl  the 
Pentateuch  had  been  reduced  to  writing  and  made  an  authori- 
tative code  of  laws  for  the  people/)  This  served  as  a  bond  of 
union  among  them  during  the  exile,  and  after  their  return  to 
Palestine,  in  538  B.C.,  the  study  and  observance  of  this  law  became 
the  most  important  duty  of  their  livesj)  The  synagogue  was 
established  in  every  village  for  its  exposition,  where  twice  on 
every  Sabbath  day  the  people  were  to  gather  to  hear  the  law  ex- 
pounded. )  A  race  of  Scribes,  or  scripture  scholars,  also  arose  to 
teach  the  law,  as  well  as  means  for  educating  additional  scribes. 
They  were  to  interpret  the  law,  and  to  apply  it  to  the  daily  lives 
of  the  people. 
y^  ReaHzing,  after  the  return  from  captivity,  that  the  future 
existence  of  the  Hebrew  people  would  dependpnot  upon  their 
military  strength,  but  upon  their  moral  unity,  and  that  this  must 
be  based  upon  the  careful  training  of  each  child  in  the  traditions 
of  his  fathers^  the  leaders  of  the  people  began  the  evolution  of  a 
religious  school  system  to  meet  the  national  need.  Realizing, 
too,  that  parents  could  not  be  depended  upon  in  all  cases  to  pro- 
vide this  instruction,  the  leaders  provided  it  and  made  it  com- 
pulsoryy  Great  open-air  Bible  classes  were  organized  at  first, 
and  these  were  gradually  extended  to  all  the  villages  of  the  coun- 
try^ Elementary  schools  were  developed  later  and  attached  to 
the  synagogues,  and  finally,  in  64  a.d.,  the  high  priest,  Joshua  ben 
Gamala,  ordered  the  establishment  of  an  elementary  school  in 
every  villagey  made  attendance  compulsory  for  all  male  children, 
and  provided  for  a  combined  type  of  religious  and  household 
instruction  at  home  for  all  girls.y  Reading,  writing,  counting,  the 
history  of  the  Chosen  People,  the  poetry  of  the  Psalms,  the  Law 
of  the  Pentateuch,  and  a  part  of  the  Talmud  constituted  the 
subject-matter  of  instruction.  The  instruction  was  largely  oral, 
and  learning  by  heart  was  the  common  teaching  plan.^  The  child 
was  taught  the  Law  of  his  fathers,  trained  to  make  holiness  a  rule 
of  his  life  and  to  subordinate  his  will  to  that  of  the  one  God,  and 
commanded  to  revere  his  teachers  (R.  27)  and  uphold  the  tradi- 
tions of  his  people./ 

After  the  destruction  of  Jerusalem  (70  a.d.)  and  the  scatter- 
ment  of  the  people,  the  school  instruction  was  naturally  more  or 


CONTRIBUTION  OF  CHRISTIANITY         47 

less  disrupted,  but  in  one  way  or  another  the  Hebrew  people  have 
ever  since  managed  to  keep  up  the  training  of  rabbis  and  the 
instruction  of  the  young  in  the  Law  and  the  traditions  of  their 
people,  and  as  a  consequence  of  this  instruction  we  have  to-day 
the  interesting  result  of  a  homogeneous  people  who,  for  over 
ejghte^n  centuries,  have  had  no  national  existence,  and  who  have 
been  scattered  and  persecuted  as  have  no  other^ieople.-  History 
offers  us  no  better  example  of  the  salvation  of  a  people  by  means 

/  of  the  compulsory  education  of  all.  ^ 

The  new  Christian  faith,  (it  was  into  this  Hebrew  race  that 
Jesus  was  bom,  and  there  he  hved,  learned,  taught,  made  his 
disciples,  and  was  crucified.  Building  on  the  old  Hebrew  moral 
law  and  the  importance  of  the  personal  Hfe,  Jesus  made  his  appeal 
to  the  individual,  and  sought  the  moral  regeneration  of  society 
through  the  moral  regeneration  of  individual  men  and  womenJ 

(This  idea  of  individuaHty  and  of  personal  souls  worth  saving  was 
a  new  idea  in  a  world  where  the  submergence  of  the  individual 
in  the  State  had  everywhere  up  to  that  time  been  the  rule^)  Even 
the  Hebrews,  in  their  great  desire  to  perpetuate  their  race  and 
faith,  had  suppressed  and  absorbed  the  individual  in  their  reHgious 
State_^(The  teachings  of  Jesus,  on  the  other  hand,  with  their 
emphasis  on  charity,  sympathy,  seK-sacrifice,  and  the  brother- 
hood of  all  men,  tended  to  obliterate  nationality,  while  the 
emphasis  they  gave  to  the  future  Ufe,  for  which  life  herejva^  but^ 

_a  preparation,  tended  to  subordinate  the  interests  oPthe  State 
and  withdraw  the  concern  of  men  from  worldly  affairs^  In  a 
series  of  simple  sermons,  Jesus  set  forth  the  basis  of  this  new  faith 
which  he,  and  after  him  his  disciples,  offered  to  the  world.y 

^i  The  challenge  of  Christianity.  [Into  a  Roman  world  that  had 
already  passed  the  zenith  of  its  greatness  came  this  new  Christian 
faith,  challenging  almost  everything  for  which  the  Roman  world 
had  stood,  i  In  place  of  Roman  citizenship  and  service  to  the 
State  as  the  purpose  of  life,  the  Christians  set  up  the  importance 
of  the  lifg_  to  come.  Instead  of  pleasure  and  hagpiness  and  the 
satisfaction  of  the  senses  as  personal  ends,  the  Christians  preached 
denial  of  all  these  things  for  the  greater  joy  of  a  future  life)  In 
a  society  built  on  a  huge  basis  of  slavery  and  filled  with  social 
classes,  the  Christians  proclaimed  the  equaHty  of  all  men  before 
God-  To  a  nation  in  which  family  life  had  become  corruptA 
infidelity  and  divorce  common,  and  infanticide  a  prevailing  prac-  1 
tice,  the  Christians  proclaimed  the  sacredness  of  the  marriage  tie/ 


48  A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

and  the  family  life,  and  the  exposure  of  infants  as  simple  murdeiy 
1  In  place  of  the  subjection  of  the  individual  to  the  State,  the 
Christians  demanded  the  subjection  of  the  individual  only  to  God^ 
In  place  of  a  union  of  State  and  religion,  the  Christians  demanded 
the  complete  separa^on  of  the  two'and  the  subordination  of  the 
State  to  the  Churchj)  Unlike  all  other  reHgions  that  Rome  had 
absorbed,  the  Christians  refused  to  be  accepted  on  any  other 
than  exclusive  terms.  ( The  worship  of  all  other  gods  the  Chris- 
tians held  to  be  sinful  iobl- worship,  a  deadly  sin  in  the  eyes  of  God, 
and  they  were  willing  to  give  up  their  Hves  rather  than  perform 
the  simplest  rite  of  what  they  termed  pagan  worship  (R.  2S)j  To 
the  deified  Emperor  the  Christians  naturally  could  not  bend  the 
Jinee  (Rs.  30  b,  31  a-b,  34)0   ^ 

^  The  victory  of  Christianity.  (By  the  close  of  the  first  century 
there  were  Christian  churches^throughout  most  of  Judea  and 
Asia  Minor,]  and  in  parts  of  Greece  and  MacedoniaX  During  the 
second  century  other  churches  were  established  in  Asia  Minor^ 
in  Greece,  and  along  the  Black  Sea,  and  at  a  few  places  in  Italy 
and  France;  and  before  foiirxeriti^nes  had  elapsed  from  the  cruci- 
fixion Christian  churches  had  been  established  throughout  almost 
all  the  Roman  world.^  The  unity  in  government  that  Rome  had 
everywhere  established;  the  Roman  peace  {pax  Romano)  that 
Rome  had  everywhere  imposed;  the  spread  of  the  Greek  and  Latin 
languages  and  ideas  throughout  the  Mediterranean  world;  the 
right  of  freedom  of  travel  and  speech  enjoyed  by  a  Roman  citizen, 
and  of  which  Saint  Paul  and  others  on  their  travels  took  advan- 
tage]\he  scatterment  of  Jews  throughout  the  Empire,  after  the 
destruction  of  Jerusalem  in  70  a.d.  —  all  these  elements  also 
helped.  ) 

C  That  "Christianity  made  its  headway  unmolested  must  not  be 
supposed.  While  at  first  the  tendency  of  educated  Romans  and 
of  the  government  was  to  ignore  or  tolerate  it,  its  challenge  was  so 
direct  and  provocative  that  this  attitude  could  not  long  continue.^ 
In  the  first  century  the  Christians  had  been  largely  ignored.  In 
the  second,  in  some  places,  they  were  pumshed.  In  the  third 
century,  impelled  by  the  calamities  of  the  State  and  the  urging 
of  those  who  would  restore  the  national  religion  to  its  earlier 
position,  the  Emperors  were  gradually  driven  to  a  series  of  heavy 
persecutions  of  the  sect  (R.  30  a)^  But  it  had  now  become  too 
late.CJThe  blood  of  the  martyrs  proved  to  be  the  seed  of  the  Church/ 
(R.  35).     The  last  great  persecution  under  the  Emperor  Diocle- 


CONTRIBUTION  OF  CHRISTIANITY         49 

tian,  in  303  (R.  33),  ended  in  virtual  failure.  (In  311  the  Em- 
peror Galerius  placed  Christianity  on  a  plane  of  equaUty  with 
other  forms  of  worship  (R.  36)r)(ti  313  Constantine  made  it  in 
part  the  official  religion  of  the^ate,  and  ordered  freedom  of  wor- 
ship for  allN  He  and  succeeding  Emperors  gradually  extended  to 
the  Christian  clergy  a  long  list  of  important  privileges  (R.  38) 
and  exemptions,  analogous  to  those  formerly  enjoyed  by  the 
teachers  of  rhetoric  under  the  Empire  (R.  26),  and  likewise  be- 
gan the  policy,  so  Uberally  followed  later,  of  endowing  the  Church^ 
In  391  the  Emperor  Theodosius  forbade  all  gagan  worship,  thus 
making  the  victory  of  Christianity  c^iplgte-  In  less  than  four 
centurifiS-from  the  birth  of  its  founder  the  Christian  faith  had 
won  control  of  the  great  Empire  in  which  it  originated^  In  529 
the  Emperor  Justinian  ordered  the  closing  of  all  pagan  schools, 
and  the  University  of  Athens,  which  had  remained  the  center  of 
pagan  thought  after  the  success  of  Christianity,  closed  its  doors.) 
The  victory  was  now  complete.^ 

N  The  contribution  of  Christianity.  CWe  have  now  before  us  the 
third  great  contribution  upon  which  our  modem  civilization  has 
been  built.  To  the  great  contributions  of  Greece  and  Rome, 
which  we  have  previously  studied,  there  now  was  added,  and 
added  at  a  most  opportune  time,  the  contribution  of  Christianity/) 
In  taking  the  Jewish  idea  of  one  God  and  freeing  it  from  the  nar- 
row tribal  umitations  to  which  it  had  before  been  subject,  Chris- 
tianity made  possible  its  general  acceptance,  first  in  the  Roman 
world,  and  later  in  the  Mohammedan  world.")  (VV^ith  this  was 
introduced  the  doctrine  of  the  fatherhood  of  God  and  his  love  for 
mam  the  equality  before  God  of  all  men  and  of  the  two  sexes,  and 

'The  sacredness  of  each  individual  in  the  eyes  of  the  Father.  [  An 
entirely  new  conception  of  the  individual  was  proclaimed  to  the 
world,  and  an  entirely  new  ethical  code  was  promulgated.  The 
duty  of  all  to  make  their  lives  conform  to  these  new  conceptions 
was  asserted.  VThese  ideas  imparted  to  ancient  society  a  new 
hopefulness  and  a  new  energy  which  were  not  only  of  great 
importance  in  dealing  with  the  downfall  of  civilization  and  the 
deluge  of  barbarism  which  were  impending,  but  which  have  been 
of  prime  importance  during  all  succeeding  centuries^nhi  time 
the  church  organization  which  was  developed  gradually  ab- 
sorbed all  other  forms  of  government,  and  became  virtually  the 
State  during  the  long  period  of  darkness  known  as  the  Middle 
Ages. 


A 


50  A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

It  remains  now  to  sketch  briefly  how  the  Church  organized 
itself  and  became  powerful  enough  to  perform  its  great  task  dur- 
ing the  Middle  Ages,  what  educational  agencies  it  developed,  and 
to  what  extent  these  were  useful. 


"^II.  EDUCATIONAL  AND  GOVERNMENTAL  ORGANIZATION  OF 
THE  EARLY  CHURCH 

Schooling  of  the  early  Church;  catechumenal  instruction.    The 

early  churches  were  bound  together  by  no  formal  bond  of  union, 
and  felt  little  need  for  such.  It  was  the  belief  of  many  that 
Christ  would  soon  return  and  the  world  would  end,  hence  there 
was  little  necessity  for  organization.  There  was  also  almost  no 
system  of  belief.  An  acknowledgment  of  God  as  the  Father,  a 
repentance  for  past  sins,  a  godly  life,  and  a  desire  to  be  saved  were 
about  all  that  was  expected  of  any  one.  The  chief  concern  was 
the  moral  regeneration  of  society  through  the  moral  regeneration 
of  converts.  To  accomplish  this,  in  face  of  the  practices  of 
Roman  society,  a  process  of  instruction  and  a  period  of  probation 
for  those  wishing  to  join  the  faith  soon  became  necessary.  Jews, 
pagans,  and  the  children  of  believers  were  thereafter  alike  sub- 
jected to  this  before  full  acceptance  into  the  Church.  At  stated 
times  during  the  week  the  probationers  met  for  instruction  in 
morality  and  in  the  psalmody  of  the  Church  (R.  39) .  These  two 
subjects  constituted  almost  the  entire  instruction,  the  period 
of  probation  covering  two  or  three  years.  The  teachers  were 
merely  the  older  and  abler  members  of  the  congregation.  This 
personal  instruction  became  common  everywhere  in  the  early 
Church,  and  the  training  was  known  as  catechumenal,  that  is, 
rudimentary,  instruction. 

Catechetical  schools.  After  Christianity  had  begun  to  make 
converts  among  the  more  serious-minded  and  better-educated 
citizens  of  the  Roman  Empire,  the  need  for  more  than  rudimen- 
tary instruction  in  the  principles  of  the  church  life,  began  to  be 
felt.  Especially  was  this  the  case  in  the  places  where  Christian 
workers  came  in  contact  with  the  best  scholars  of  the  Hellenic 
learning,  and  particularly  at  Alexandria,  Athens,  and  the  cities 
of  Asia  Minor.  The  speculative  Greek  would  not  be  satisfied 
with  the  simple,  unorganized  faith  of  the  early  Christians.  He 
wanted  to  understand  it  as  a  system  of  thought,  and  asked  many 
questions  that  were  hard  to  answer.  To  meet  the  critical  inquiry 
of  learned  Greeks,  it  became  desirable  that  the  clergy  of  the 


CONTRIBUTION  OF  CHRISTIANITY         51 

Church,  in  the  East  at  least,  should  be  equipped  with  a  training 
similar  to  that  of  their  critics.  As  a  result  there  was  finally 
evolved,  first  at  Alexandria,  and  later  at  other  places  in  the 
Empire,  training  schools  for  the  leaders  of  the  Church.  These 
came  to  be  known  as  catechetical  schools,  from  their  oral  ques- 
tioning method  of  instruction,  and  this  term  was  later  applied  to 
elementary  religious  instruction  (whence  catechism)  throughout 
western  Europe. 

Rejection  of  pagan  learning  in  the  West.  In  the  West,  where 
the  leaders  of  the  Church  came  from  the  less  philosophic  and 
more  practical  Roman  stock,  and  where  the  contact  with  a  deca- 
dent society  wakened  a  greater  reaction,  the  tendency  was  to 
reject  the  Hellenic  learning,  and  to  depend  more  upon  emotional 
faith  and  the  enforcement  of  a  moral  life^  By  the  close  of  the 
third  century  the  hostility  to  the  pagan  schools  and  to  the  Hel- 
lenic learning  had  here  become  pronounced  (R.  41). 

As  a  result  Hellenic  learning  declined  rapidly  in  importance  in 
Ahe  West  as  the  Church  attained  supremacy,  and  finally,  in  401, 
Vthe  Council  of  Carthage,jlargely  at  the  instigation  of  Saint  Augus- 
tine, forbade  the  clergy  to  read  any  pagan  author.^ In  time 
Greek  learning  largelv  died  out  in  the  West,  and  was  for  a  time 
almost  entirely  lost.^Even  the  Greek  language  was  forgotten,  and 
was  not  known  again  in  the  West  for  nearly  a  thousand  years^ 
"The  Church  perfects  a  strong  organization.  As  was  previously 
stated  (p.  50),  but  little  need  was  felt  during  the  first  two  centu- 
ries for  a  system  of  belief  or  church  government.  As  the  expected 
return  of  Christ  did  not  take  place,  and  as  the  need  for  a  formula- 
tion of  belief  and  a  system  of  government  began  to  be  felt,  the 
next  step  was  the  development  of  these  features.  (jThe  system 
of  belief  and  the  ceremonials  of  worship  finally  evolved  are  more 
the  products  of  Greek  thought  and  practices  of  the  East,  while 
the  form  of  organization  and  government  is  derived  more  from 
Roman  sources^  In  the  second  century  the  Old  Testament  was 
translated  into  Greek  at  Alexandria,  and  the  "Apostles'  Creed" 
was  formulated.  During  the  third  century  the  writings  deemed 
sacred  were  organized  into  the  New  Testament,  also  in  Greek. 
In  325  the  first  General  Council  of  the  Church  was  held  at  Nicaea, 
in  Asia  Minor.  It  formulated  the  Nicene  Creed  (R.  42),  and 
twenty  canons  or  laws  for  the  government  of  the  Church.  A 
second  General  Council,  held  at  Constantinople  in  381,  revised 
the  Nicene  Creed  and  adopted  additionaTcanons. 


52 


A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


Fig. 12. 
A  Bishop 


The  great  organizing  genius  of  the  western  branch  of  the 
Church  was  Saint  Augustine  (354-430).  He 
gave  to  the  Western  or  Latin  Church,  then  be- 
ginning to  take  on  its  separate  existence,  the 
body  of  doctrine  needed  to  enable  it  to  put 
into  shape  the  things  for  which  it  stood.  The 
system  of  theology  evolved  before  the  separation 
of  the  eastern  and  western  branches  of  the  Church 
was  not  so  finished  and  so  finely  speculative  as 
that  of  the  Greek  branch,  but  was  more  prac- 
tical, more  clearly  legal,  and  more  systematically 
organized. 

^The  influence  of  Rome  was  strong  also  in  the 
organization  of  the  system  of  government  finally 
adopted  for  the  Church.  •)  There  being  no  other 
model,  the  Roman  governmental    system  was 
copied.]  The  bishop  of  a  city  corresponded  to  thel' 
Roman  municipal  officials  ;j  the  archbishop  of  a  \ 
territory  to  the  governor  of  a  province;  and  the  1 
laro'Ve'nTnzTo^   Pf  triarch  to  the  ruler  of  a  division  of  the  Em-  \ 
Rome)  pire.    As  Rome  had  been  a  universal  Empire,    I 

and  as  the  city  of  Rome  had  been  the  chief  gov^ 
eming  city,  the  idea  of  a  universal  Church  was  natural  and  the 
supremacy  of  the  Bishop  of  Rome  was  gradually  asserted  and 
determined.  ] 

A  State  within  a  State.  There  was  thus  developed  in  the  West, 
as  it  were  a  State  within  a  State.  That  is,  within  the  Roman 
Empire,  with  its  Emperor,  provincial  governors,  and  municipal 
officials,  governing  the  people  and  drawing  their  power  from  the 
Roman  Senate  and  imperial  authority,  there  was  also  gradually 
developed  another  State,\:onsisting  of  those  who  had  accepted 
the  Christian  faith,";ana  who  rendered  their  chief  allegiance, 
through  priest,  bishop,  and  archbishop,  to  a  central  head  of  the 
Church  who  owed  allegiance  to  no  earthly  rul^^  That  Christian- 
ity, viewed  from  the  governmental  point  of  view,  was  a  serious 
element  of  weakness  in  the  Roman  State  and  helped  its  downfall, 
there  can  be  no  questio^^  In  the  eastern  part  of  the  Empire  the 
Church  was  always  much  more  closely  identified  with  the  State. 
Fortunately  for  civilization,  before  the  Roman  Empire  had  fallen 
and  the  impending  barbarian  deluge  had  descended,  the  Christian 
Church  had  succeeded  in  formulating  a  unifying  belief  and  a  form 


CONTRIBUTION  OF  CHRISTIANITY         53 

of  government  capable  of  commanding  respect  and  of  enforcing 
authority,  and  was  fast  taking  over  the  power  of  the  State  itself^ 

The  cathedral  or  episcopal  schools.   The  first  churches  through- 
out the  Empire  were  in  the  cities,  and  made  their  early  converts 
there?)  Gradually  these  important  cities  evolved  into  the  resi- 
dences of  a  supervising  priest  or  bishop^  the  territory  became 
known  as  a  bishopric)  and  the  church  as  a  cathedral  church.     In 
time,  also,  some  of  the  outlying  territory  was  organized  into  par- 
ishes^^and  churches  were  estabhshed  in  these?)  These  were  made 
tributary  to  and  placed  under  the  direction'^of  the  bishop  of  the 
large  central  cit^^)  To  supply  clergy  for  these  outlying  parishes 
came  to  be  one  of  the  functions  of  the  bishop,  and,  to  insure  prop- 
erly trained  clergy  and  to  provide  for  promotions  in  the  clerical         r; 
ranks'^  schools  of  a  rudimentary  type  were  established  in  connec-^^^  :  ^ 
tion'with  the  cathedral  churches?)  These  came  to  be  known  as  ?0"  ^ 
cathedral,  or  episcopal  schools?)  ^St  first  they  were  probably  under  ^ 
the  immediate  charge  of  the  bishop^  but  later,  as  his  functions 
increased,  the  school  was  placed  under  a  special  teacher,  known 
as  a  Scholasticus^or  M agister  Scholarum^ho  directed  the  cathe-*\^  >2> 
dral  school,  assisted  the  bishop,  and~tfained  the  future  clergy^ >V  ^ 
As  the  pagan  secondary  schools  died  out,  these  cathedral  schooIsS 
together  with  the  monastic  schools  which  were  later  founded^ 
gradually  replaced  the  pagan  schools  as  the  important  educational 
institutions  of  the  western  world.     In  these  two  types  of  schools 
the  religious  leaders  of  the  early  Middle  Ages  were  trained. 

The  monastic  organization.  In  the  early  days  of  Christianity, 
it  will  be  remembered  (p.  48),  the  Christian  convert  held  himself 
apart  from  the  wicked  world  all  about  him,  and  had  little  to  do 
with  the  society  or  the  government  of  his  time.  He  regarded  the 
Church  as  having  no  relationship  to  the  State?\  As  the  Church 
grew  stronger,  however,  and  became  a  State  Within  a  State,  the 
Christian  took  a  larger  and  larger  part  in  the  world  around  him, 
and  in  time  came  to  be  distinguished  from  other  men  by  his  pro- 
fession of  the  Christian  religion  rather  than  by  any  other  mark. 
Many  of  the  early  bishops  were  men  of  great  political  sagacity, 
fully  capable  of  realizing  to  the  full  the  poHtical  opportunities, 
afforded  by  their  position,  to  strengthen  the  power  of  the  Church. 
It  was  the  work  of  men  of  this  type  that  created  the  temporal 
power  of  the  Church,  and  made  of  it  an  institution  capable  of 
commanding  respect  and  enforcing  its  decisions. 

To  some  of  the  early  Christians  this  life  did  not  appeal.  /  To 


54         A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

them  holiness  was  associated  with  a  complete  withdrawal  from 
contact  with  this  sinful  world  and  all  its  activities?)  Some  betook 
themselves  to  the  desert,  others  to  the  forests  or  mountains,  and 
others  shut  themselves  up  alone  that  they  might  be  undisturbed 
in  their  religious  meditations/^  To  such  devoted  souls  monasti- 
cism,  a  scheme  of  living  brought  into  the  Christian  world  from 
the  East,  made  a  strong  appeal^  It  provided  that  such  men 
should  live  together  in  brotherhoods,  renouncing  the  world,  taking 
vows  of  poverty,  chastity,  and  obedience,  and  devoting  their 
lives  to  hard  labor  and  the  mortification  of  the  flesh  that  the  soul 
might  be  exalted  and  made  beautifuD  The  members  lived  alone 
in  individual  cells,  but  came  togemer  for  meals,  prayer,  and 
religious  service^ 

As  early  as  330  a  monastery  had  been  organized  on  the  island 
of  Tebernae,  in  the  NileT)  About  350  Saint  Basil  introduced  mo- 
nasticism  into  Asia  Minor,  where  it  flourished  greatly.  In  370  the 
Basilian  order  was  founded.  The  monastic  idea  was  soon  trans- 
ferred to  the  West,  a  monastery  being  established  at  Rome  prob- 
ably as  early  as  340.  The  monastery  of  Saint  Victor,  at  INlar- 
seilles,  was  founded  by  Cassian  in  404,  and  this  type  of  monastery 
and  monastic  rule  was  introduced  into  Gaul,  about  415.  The 
monastery  of  Lerins  (off  Cannes,  in  southern  France)  was  estab- 
lished in  405.  (  During  the  fifth  century  a  rapid  extension  of  mo- 
nastic foundations  took  place  in  western  Europe,  particularly  along 
the  valleys  of  the  Rhone  and  the  Loire  in  Gauj^  In  529  Saint 
(  Bemgdict,  a  Roman  of  wealth  who  fled  from  the  corruption  of  his 
city,  founded  the  monastery  of  Monte  Cassino,  south  of  Rome, 
and  established  a  form  of  government,  or  rule  of  daily  life,  which 
was  gradually  adopted  by  nearly  all  the  monasteries  of  the  Westy 
In  time  Europe  came  to  be  dotted  with  thousands  of  these  estab- 
lishments, many  of  which  were  large  and  expensive  institutions 
both  to  found  and  to  maintain^  By  the  time  the  barbarian  inva- 
sions were  in  full  swing  monasticism  had  become  an  established 
institution  of  the  Christian  Church.  )  Nunneries  for  women  also 
were  established  early. 

Monastic  schools.  Poverty,  chastity,  obedience,  labor,  and 
religious  devotion  were  the  essential  features  of  a  monastic  life^ 
The  Rule  of  Saint  Benedict  (R.  43)  organized  in  a  practical  waj 
the  efforts  of  those  who  took  the  vows.  In  a  series  of  seventy. 
three  rules  which  he  laid  down,  covering  all  phases  of  monastic 
life,  the  most  important  from  the  standpoint  of  posterity  was  th' 


CONTRIBUTION  OF  CHRISTIANITY         55 

forty-eighth,  prescribing  at  least  seven  hours  of  daily  labor  and  two 
hours  of  reading  ''for  all  able  to  bear  the  load?)  From  that  part 
of  the  rule  requiring  regular  manual  labor  the  monks  became  the 
most  expert  farmers  and  craftsmen  of  the  early  Middle  Ages,  while 
to  the  requirement  of  daily  reading  we  owe  in  large  part  the  devel- 
opment of  the  school  and  the  preservation  of  learning  in  the  West 
during  the  long  intellectual  night  of  the  mediaeyaljperiod  (R.  44). 

Into  these  monastic  institutions  the  ohlati,  that  is,  those  who 
wished  to  become  monks,  were  received  as  early  as  the  age  of 
twelve,  and  occasionally  earlier  (R.  53  a) .  The  final  vows  (x.  53  b) 
could  not  be  taken  until  eighteen,  so  during  this  period  the  novice 
was  taught  to  work  and  to  read  and  write,  given  instruction  in 
church^jnusic,  and  taught  to  calculate  the  church  festivals  and 
to  do  simple  reckoning.  In  time  some  condensed  and  carefully 
edited  compendium  of  the  elements  of  classical  learning  was  also 
studied,  and  still  later  a  more  elaborate  type  of  instruction  was 
developed  in  some  of  the  monasterie^sT?  This,  however,  belongs 
to  a  later  division  of  this  history,  and  further  description  of 
church  and  monastic  education  will  be  deferred  until  we  study 
the  intellectual  life  of  the  Middle  Ages^- 

The  education  of  girls.  Aside  from  the  general  instruction  in 
the  practices  of  the  church  and  home  instruction  in  the  work  of  a 
woman,  there  was  but  little  provision  made  for  the  education  of 
girls  not  desiring  to  join  a  convent  or  nunner}^  A  few,  however, 
obtained  a  limited  amount  of  intellectual  training.  The  letter  of 
Saint  Jerome  to  the  Roman  lady  Paula  (R.  45),  regarding  the 
education  of  her  daughter,  is  a  very  important  document  in  the 
history  of  early  Christian  education  for  girls.  \  Dating  from  403,  it 
outlines  the  type  of  training  a  young  girl  should  be  given  who 
was  to  be  properly,  educated  in  Christian  faith  and  properly  con- 
secrated to  God.  '^^Tiat  he  outlined  was  education  for  nunneries, 
a  number  of  whidi  had  been  founded  in  the  East  and  a  few  in  the 
West.  In  the  West  these  institutions  later  experienced  an.  exten- 
sive development,  and  offered  the  chief  opportunity  for  any  intel-  . 
lectual  education  for  women  during  the  whole  of  the  Middle  Ages.    ) 

/  V    III.  WHAT  THE  MIDDLE  AGES  STARTED  WITH 

What  the  Church  brought  to  the  Middle  Ages.  From  a  small 
and  purely  spiritual  organization,  devoting  its  energies  to  exhorta- 
tion and  to  the  moral  regeneration  of  mankind,  and  without  creed 
or  form  of  government,  as  the  Christian  Church  was  in  the  first 


56         A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

two  centuries  of  its  development,  we  have  traced  the  organization 
of  a  body  of  doctrine,  the  perfection  of  a  strong  system  of  church 
government,  and  the  development  of  a  very  limited  educational 
system  designed  merely  to  train  leaders  for  its  service.  We  have 
also  shown  how  it  added  to  its  early  ecclesiastical  organization  a 
strong  governmental  organization,  became  a  State  within  a  State, 
and  gradually  came  to  direct  the  State  itself.  It  was  thus  ready, 
when  the  virtual  separation  of  the  Roman  Empire  into  an  eastern 
and  western  division  took  place,  in  395,  and  when  the  western 
division  -finally  fell  before  the  barbarian  onslaughts,  to  take  up 
in  a  way  the  work  of  the  State,  force  the  barbarian  hordes  to 
acknowledge  its  power,  and  begin  the  process  of  civilizing  these 
new  tribes  and  building  up  once  more  a  civilization  in  the  western 
world.  In  addition  to  its  spiritual  and  political  power,  the  Church 
also  had  developed,  in  its  catechumenal  instruction  and  in  the 
cathedral  and  monastic  schools,  a  very  meager  form  of  an  educa- 
tional system  for  the  training  of  its  future  leaders  and  servants. 
\A.  great  change  had  now  taken  place  in  the  nature  of  education  as 
a  preparation  for  life,  and  intellectual  education,  in  the  sense  that 
it  was  known  and  understood  in  Greece  and  Rome,  was  not  to  be 
known  again  in  the  western  world  for  almost  a  thousand  years. 
The  distinguishing  characteristic  of  the  centuries  which  follow, 
up  to  the  Revival  of  Learning,  are,  first,  a  struggle  against  very 
adverse  odds  to  prevent  civilization  from  disappearing  entirely, 
and  later  a  struggle  to  build  up  new  foundations  upon  which  world 
civilization  might  begin  once  more  where  it  had  left  off  in  Greece 
and  Rome.\ 

The  three  great  contributions  from  the  ancient  world.  Thus, 
before  the  Middle  Ages  began,  the  three  great  contributions  of 
the  ancient  world  which  were  to  form  the  foundations  of  our 
future  western  civiHzation  had  been  made.  Greece  gave  the 
world  an  art  and  a  philosophy  and  a  literature  of  great  charm  and 
beauty,  the  most  advanced  intellectual  and  aesthetic  ideas  that 
civilization  has  inherited,  and  developed  an  educational  system 
of  wonderful  effectiveness  —  one  that  in  its  higher  development 
in  time  took  captive  the  entire  Mediterranean  world  and  pro- 
foundly modified  all  later  thinking?)!^  Rome  was  the  organizing 
and  legal  genius  of  the  ancient  world,  as  Greece  was  the  literary 
and  philosophical..  To  Rome  we  are  especially  indebted  for  our 
conceptions  of  law,  order,  and  government,  and  for  the  ability 
to  make  practical  and  carry  into  effect  the  ideals  of  other  peoples. ^ 


CONTRIBUTION  OF  CHRISTIANITY  57 


(t 


To  the  Hebrews  we  are  indebted  for  the  world's  loftiest  concep- 
tions of  God,  religious  faith,  and  moral  responsibility^)  and  to 
Christianity  and  the  Church  we  are  indebted  for  making  these 
ideas  universal  in  the  Roman  Empire  and  forcing  them  on  a 
barbaric  world.j) 

All  these  great  foundations  of  our  western  civihzation  have  not 
come  down  to  us  directly. J)  The  hostility  to  pagan  learning  that 
developed  on  the  part  of  tne  Latin  Fathers;  the  establishment  of 
an  eastern  capital  for  the  Empire  at  Constantinople,  in  328;  the 
virtual  division  of  the  Empire  into  an  East  and  West,  in  395 ;  and 
the  final  division  of  the  Christian  Church  into  a  Western  Latin 
and  an  Eastern  Greek  Church,  which  was  gradually  effected, 
finally  drove  Greek  philosophy  and  learning  and  the  Greek  lan- 
guage from  the  western  world/^  Greek  was  not  to  be  known  again 
in  the  West  for  hundreds  oT  years  J  Fortunately  the  Eastern 
Church  was  more  tolerant  of  pagan  learning  than  was  the  West- 
em,  and  was  better  able  to  withstand  conquest  by  barbarian 
tribes.  Li  consequence  what  the  Greeks  had  done  was  preserved 
at  Constantinople  until  Europe  had  once  more  become_sufficiently 
civilized  and  tolerant  to  understand  and  appreciate  it.  Hellenic 
learning  was  then  handed  back  to  western  Europe,  first^ through 
the  medium  of  the  Saracens,  and  then  in  that  great  Revival  of 
Learning  which  we  know  as  the  Renaissance^ 

The  future  story.  For  the  long  period  of  intellectual  stagnation 
which  now  followed,  the  educational  story  is  briefly  told.  But 
little  formal  education  was  needed,  and  that  of  but  one  main  type. 

C^It  was  only  after  the  Church  had  won  its  victory  over  the  bar- 
barian hordes,  and  had  built  up  the  foundations  upon  which  a 
new  civilization  could  be  developed,  that  education  in  any  broad 
and  liberal  sense  was  again  needed.J  {This  required  nearly  a  thou- 
sand years  of  laborious  and  painful  effor{)  Then,  when  schools 
again  became  possible  and  learning  again  began  to  be  demanded, 
education  had  to  begin  again  with  the  few  at  the  top,  and  the 

'  contributions  of  Greece  and  Rome  had  to  be  recovered  and  put 
into  usable  form  as  a  basis  upon  which  to  build.  It  is  only  very 
recently  that  it  has  become  possible  to  extend  education  to  allj^ 
In  Part  II  we  shall  next  trace  briefly  the  intellectual  life  of  the 
Middle  Ages,  and  the  reawakening,  and  in  Part  III  we  shall, 
among  other  things,  point  out  the  deep  and  lasting  influence  of 
the  work  of  these  ancient  civilizations  on  our  modem  educa- 
tional thoughts  and  practices. 


58         A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

\  I.  Point  out  the  many  advantages  of  a  universal  religion  for  such  a  univer- 
sal Empire  as  Rome  developed,  and  the  advantages  of  Emperor  worship 
for  such  an  Empire. 

2.  What  do  modern  nations  have  that  is  much  akin  to  Emperor  worship? 

3.  Explain  how  the  Hebrew  scribes,  administering  such  a  mixed  body  of 
laws,  naturally  came  to  be  both  teachers  and  judges  for  the  people. 

4.  Illustrate  how  the  Hebrew  tradition  that  the  moral  and  spiritual  unity 
of  a  people  is  stronger  than  armed  force  has  been  shown  to  be  true  in 
history. 

5.  What  great  lessons  may  we  draw  from  the  work  of  the  Hebrews  in  main- 
taining a  national  unity  through  compulsory  education? 

6.  Why  was  Jesus'  idea  as  to  the  importance  of  the  individual  destined  to 
make  such  slow  headway  in  the  world?  What  is  the  status  of  the  idea 
to-day  (a)  in  China?  (b)  in  Germany?  (c)  in  England?  (d)  in  the 
United  States?  Is  the  idea  necessarily  opposed  to  nationality  or  even 
to  a  strong  state  government? 

[  7.  Show  how  the  pohtical  Church,  itself  the  State,  was  the  natural  outcome 
during  the  Middle  Ages  of  the  teachings  of  the  early  Christians  as  to  the 
relationship  of  Church  and  State. 

8.  Is  it  to  be  wondered  that  the  Romans  were  finally  led  to  persecute  "the 
vast  organized  defiance  of  law  by  the  Christians"? 

9.  Show  how  the  Christian  idea  of  the  equality  and  responsibility  of  all 
gave  the  citizen  a  new  place  in  the  State. 

10.  Explain  what  is  meant  by  "a  State  within  a  State"  as  applied  to  the 
Church  of  the  third  and  fourth  centuries.  Did  this  prove  to  be  a  good 
thing  for  the  future  of  civihzation?     Why? 

11.  Woidd  Rome  probably  have  been  better  able  to  withstand  the  barbarian 
invasions  if  Christianity  had  not  arisen,  or  not?     Why? 

12.  Show  how  the  Christian  attitude  toward  pagan  learning  tended  to  stop 
schools  and  destroy  the  accumulated  learning. 

13.  What  was  the  effect  of  the  Christian  attitude  toward  the  care  of  the  body, 
on  scientific  and  medical  knowledge,  and  on  education?  Was  the  Chris- 
tian or  the  pagan  attitude  more  nearly  like  that  of  modern  times? 

14.  Why  did  the  emphasis  on  form  of  behef ,  in  the  third  and  fourth  centuries, 
come  to  supersede  the  emphasis  on  personal  virtues  and  simple  faith  of 
the  first  and  second  centuries? 

1 5.  Compare  the  work  of  the  Sunday  School  of  to-day  with  the  catechumenal 
instruction  of  the  early  Christians. 

SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  selections  are  repro- 
duced: 

27.  The  Talmud:  Educational  Maxims  from. 

28.  Saint  Paul:  Epistle  to  the  Romans. 

29.  Saint  Paul:  Epistle  to  the  Athenians. 

30.  The  Crimes  of  the  Christians. 

(a)  Mincius  Fehx:  The  Roman  Point  of  View. 

(b)  TertuUian:  The  Christian  Point  of  View. 

31.  Persecution  of  the  Christians  as  Disloyal  Subjects  of  the  Empire. 

(a)  Pliny  to  Trajan. 
lb)  Trajan  to  Pliny. 


CONTRIBUTION  OF  CHRISTIANITY         59 

32.  TertuIKan:  Effect  of  the  Persecutions. 

33.  Eusebius:  Edicts  of  Diocletian  against  the  Christians. 

34.  Workman:  Certificate  of  having  Sacrificed  to  the  Pagan  Gods. 

35.  Kingsley:  The  Empire  and  Christianity  in  Conflict. 

36.  Lactantius:  The  Edict  of  Toleration  by  Galerius. 

37.  Theodosian  Code:  The  Faith  of  Cathohc  Christians. 

38.  Theodosian  Code:  Privileges  and  Immunities  granted  the  Clergy. 

39.  Apostolic  Constitutions:  How  the  Catechumens  are  to  be  instructed. 

40.  Leach:  Catechumenal  Schools  of  the  Early  Church. 

41.  ApostoUc  Constitutions:  Christians  should  abstain  from  all  Heathen 

Books. 

42.  The  Nicene  Creed  of  325  a.d. 

43.  Saint  Benedict:  Extracts  from  the  Rule  of. 

44.  Lanfranc:  Enforcing  Lenten  Reading  in  the  Monasteries. 

45.  Saint  Jerome:  Letter  on  the  Education  of  Girls. 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

*  Dill,  Sam'l.    Roman  Society  in  the  Last  Century  of  the  Western  Empire. 
Fisher,  Geo.  P.     Beginnings  of  Christianity. 

*  Fisher,  Geo.  P.     History  of  the  Christian  Church. 

*  Hatch,  Edw.     Influence  of  Greek  Ideas  and  Usages  upon  the  Christian 

Church.     (Hibbert  Lectures.  1888.) 
Hodgson,  Geraldine.    Primitive  Church  Education.  » 

Kretzmann,  P.  E.     Education  among  the  Jews. 
MacCabe,  Joseph.     Saint  Augustine. 

*  Monro,  D.  C.  and  Sellery,  G.  E.    MeduBval  Civilization. 

*  Swift,  F.  H.     Education  in  Ancient  Israel  to  jo  a.d. 
Taylor,  H.  O.     Classical  Heritage  of  the  Middle  Ages. 
Wishart,  A.  W.    Short  History  of  Monks  and  Monasticism. 


PART  II 
THE  MEDIEVAL  WORLD 

• 

THE  DELUGE  OF  BARBARISM 

THE  MEDIEVAL  STRUGGLE  TO  PRESERVE 

AND  REESTABLISH  CIVILIZATION 


^Uh^'^i  ij.^ 


CHAPTER  V 
NEW  PEOPLES  IN  THE  EMPIRE 

The  weakened  Empire.  Though  the  first  and  second  centuries 
A.D.  have  often  been  called  one  of  the  happiest  ages  in  all  human 
history,  due  to  a  succession  of  good  Emperors  and  peace  and  quiet 
throughout  the  Roman  world,  the  reign  of  the  last  of  the  good 
Emperors,  Marcus  AureHus  (161-180  a.d.),  may  be  regarded  as 
clearly  marking  a  turning-point  in  the  history  of  Roman  society. 
Before  his  reign  Rome  was  ascendant,  prosperous,  powerful.; 
during  his  reign  the  Empire  was  beset  by  many  difficulties  — 
pestilence,  floods,  famine,  troubles  with  the  Christians,  and 
heavy  German  inroads  —  to  which  it  had  not  before  been  accus- 
tomed; and  after  his  reign  the  Empire  was  distinctly  on  the 

J  defensive  and  the  decline.  Though  the  elements  contributing 
to  this  change  in  national  destiny  had  their  origin  in  the  changes 
in  the  character  of  the  national  life  at  least  two  centuries  earlier, 
it  was  not  until  now  that  the  Empire  began  to  feel  seriously  the 
effects  of  these  changes  in  a  lowered  vitafity  and  a  weakened 
power  of  resistance.  Sooner  or  later  the  boundaries  of  the  Em- 
pire, which  had  held  against  the  pressure  from  without  for  so  long, 
were  destined  to  be  broken,  and  the  barbarian  deluge  from  the 
north  and  east  would  pour  over  the  Empire. 

The  boundaries  of  the  Empire  are  broken.  While  temporary 
extensions  of  territory  had  at  times  been  made  beyond  the 
Rhine  and  the  Danube,  these  rivers  had  finally  come  to  be  the 
established  boundaries  of  the  Empire  on  the  north,  and  behind 
these  rivers  the  Teutonic  barbarians,  or  Germani,  as  the  Romans 
called  them,  had  by  force  been  kept.  To  do  even  this  the  Romans 
had  been  obliged  to  admit  bands  of  Germans  into  the  Empire,  and 
had  taken  them  into  the  Roman  army  as  "aUies,"  making  use  of 
their  great  love  for  fighting  to  hold  other  German  tribes  in  check. 

Xin  166  A.D.  the  plague,  brought  back  by  soldiers  returning  from  the 
East,  carried  off  approximately  half  the  population  of  Italy.  This 
same  year  the  Marcomanni,  a  former  friendly  tribe,  invaded  the 
Empire  as  far  as  the  head  of  the  Adriatic  Sea,  and  it  required 

:<f  thirteen  years  of  warfare  to  put  them  back  behind  the  Danube. 
Even  this  was  accomplished  only  by  the  aid  of  friendly  German 


64 


A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


tribes.  From  this  time  on  the  Empire  was  more  or  less  on  the 
defensive,  with  the  barbarian  tribes  to  the  north  casting  increas- 
ingly longing  eyes  toward  "  a  place  in  the  sun"  and  the  rich  plun- 
der that  lay  to  the  south,  and  frequently  breaking  over  the 
boundaries. 

Who  these  invaders  were.  A  long-continued  series  of  tribal 
migrations,  unsurpassed  before  in  history,  soon  brought  a  large 
number  of  new  peoples  within  the  boundaries  of  the  old  Empire. 
They  finally  came  so  fast  that  they  could  not  have  been  assim- 
ilated even  in  the  best  days  of  Rome,  and  now 
the  assimilative  and  digestive  powers  of  Rome 
were  gone.  Tall,  huge  of  limb,  white-skinned, 
flaxen-haired,  with  fierce  blue  eyes,  and  clad  in 
skins  and  rude  cloths,  they  seemed  like  giants 
to  the  short,  small,  dark-skinned  people  of  the 
Italian  peninsula.  Quarrelsome;  delighting  in 
fighting  and  gambling;  given  to  drunkenness 
and  gluttonous  eating;  possessed  of  a  rude 
polytheistic  religion  in  which  Woden,  the  war 
god,  held  the  first  place,  and  Valhalla  was  a 
heaven  for  those  killed  in  battle;  living  in  rude 
villages  in  the  forest,  and  maintaining  them- 
selves by  hunting  and  fishing  —  it  is  not  to 
be  wondered  that  Rome  dreaded  the  coming 
of  these  forest  barbarians  (R.  46) . 
>  The  tribes  nearest  the  Rhine  and  the  Danube 
had  taken  on  a  little  civilization  from  long 
contact  with  the  Romans,  but  those  farther 
Restored,  and  rather  away  were  savage  and  unorganized  (Rs.  46, 47) . 
idealized  j^  general  they  represented  a  degree  of  civili- 

d'ArtiIlerie\tParis)  nation  not  particularly  different  from  that  of 
the  better  American  Indians  in  our  colonial 
period,  though  possessing  a  much  larger  ability  to  learn.  The 
''two  terrible  centuries"  which  brought  these  new  peoples  into  the 
Empire  were  marked  by  unspeakable  disorder  and  frightful  de- 
struction. It  was  the  most  complete  catastrophe  that  had  ever 
befallen  civilized  society. 

They  settle  down  within  the  Empire.  Finally,  after  a  period 
of  wandering  and  plundering,  each  of  these  new  peoples  settled 
down  within  the  Empire  as  rulers  over  the  numerically  larger  na- 
tive Roman  population,  and  slowly  began  to  turn  from  hunting 


Fig.  13.  A  German 
War  Chief 


NEW  PEOPLES  IN  THE  EMPIRE 


65 


to  a  rude  type  of  farming.  For  three  or  four  centuries  after  the 
invasions  ceased,  though,  Europe  presented  a  dreary  spectacle  of 
ignorance,  lawlessness,  and  violence.  Force  reigned  where  law 
and  order  had  once  been  supreme.  Work  largely  ceased,  because 
there  was  no  security  for  the  results  of  labor.  ^  The  Roman  schools 
gradually  died  out,  in  part  because  of  pagan  hostility  (all  pagan 
schools  were  closed  by  imperial  edict  in  529  a.d.),  and  in  part 
because  they  no  longer  ministered  to  any  real  need,  v  The  church 
and  the  monastery 
schools  alone  remain- 
ed, the  instruction  in 
these  was  meager  in- 
deed, and  they  served 
almost  entirely  the 
special  needs  of  the 
priestly  and  monas- 
tic classes. ;  The  Latin 
language  was  cor- 
rupted and  modified 
into  spoken  dialects, 
and  the  written  lan- 
guage died  out  except 
with  the  monks  and 
the  clergy ."^  Even  here  it  became  greatly  corrupted.  Art  per- 
ished, and  science  disappeared.  The  former  Roman  skill  in 
handicrafts  was  largely  lost.  Roads  and  bridges  were  left  with- 
out repair.  Commerce  and  intercourse  almost  ceased.^  The 
cities  decayed,  and  many  were  entirely  destroyed  (R.  49).^ 

The  new  ruling  class  was  ignorant  —  few  could  read  or  write 
their  names  —  and  they  cared  little  for  the  learning  of  Greece  and 
Rome.  Much  of  what  was  excellent  in  the  ancient  civilizations 
died  out  because  these  new  peoples  were  as  yet  too  ignorant  to 
understand  or  use  it,  and  what  was  preserved  was  due  to  the  work 
of  others  than  themselves.  It  was  with  such  people  and  on  such 
a  basis  that  it  was  necessary  for  whatever  constructive  forces  still 
remained  to  begin  again  the  task  of  building  up  new  foundations 
for  a  future  European  civilization.  This  was  the  work  of  centu- 
ries, and  during  the  period  the  lamp  of  learning  almost  went  out. 

Barbarian  and  Roman  in  contact.  Civilization  was  saved  from 
almost  complete  destruction  chiefly  by  reason  of  the  long  and  sub- 
stantial work  which  Rome  had  done  in  organizing  and  governing 


Fig.  14.  Romans  DESTROYING  a  Geiolan  Village 

(From  the  Column  of  Marcus  Aurelius,  at  Rome) 

Note  the  circular  huts  of  reeds,  without  windows,  and 

with  but  a  single  door. 


66         A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

and  unifying  the  Empire;^  by  the  relatively  slow  and  gradual 
coming  of  the  different  tribes;  and  by  the  thorough  organization 
of  the  governing  side  of  the  Christian  Church,  which  had  been 
effected  before  the  Empire  was  finally  overrun  and  Roman  govern- 
ment ceased.  In  unifying  the  government  of  the  Empire  and 
establishing  a  common  law,  language,  and  traditions,  and  in  early 
beginning  the  process  of  receiving  barbarians  into  the  Empire 
and  educating  them  in  her  ways  and  her  schools,  Rome  rendered 
the  western  world  a  service  of  inestimable  importance  and  one 
which  did  much  to  prepare  the  way  for  the  reception  and  assimi- 
lation of  the  invaders.  In  the  cities,  which  remained  Roman  in 
spirit  even  after  their  rulers  had  changed,  and  where  the  Roman 
population  greatly  preponderated  even  after  the  invaders  had 
come,  some  of  the  old  culture  and  handicrafts  were  kept  up,  and 
in  the  cities  of  southern  Europe  the  municipal  form  of  city  govern- 
ment was  retained.  Roman  law  still  applied  to  trials  of  Roman 
citizens,!'  and  many  Roman  governmental  forms  passed  over  to 
the  invader  chiefly  because  he  knew  no  other.  The  old  Roman 
population  for  long  continued  to  furnish  the  clergy,  and  these, 
because  of  their  ability  to  read  and  write,  also  became  the  secre- 
taries and  advisers  of  their  rude  Teutonic  overlords.  In  one 
capacity  or  another  they  persuaded  the  leaders  of  the  tribes  to 
adopt,  not  only  Christianity,  but  many  of  the  customs  and  prac- 
tices of  the  old  civilization  as  well.^  These  various  influences 
helped  to  assimilate  and  educate  tne  newcomers,  and  to  save 
something  of  the  old  civilization  for  the  future.  Being  strong, 
sturdy,  and  full  of  youthful  energy,  and  with  a  large  capacity  for 
learning,  the  civilizing  process,  though  long  and  difficult,  was 
easier  than  it  might  otherwise  have  been,  and  because  of  their 
strength  and  vigor  these  new  races  in  time  infused  new  life  and 
/energy  into  every  land  from  Spain  to  eastern  Europe  (R.  50). 
/  The  impress  of  Christianity  upon  them.  The  importance  of 
the  services  rendered  by  bishops,  priests,  and  monks  during  what 
are  known  as  the  Dark  Ages  can  hardly  be  overestimated.  In 
the  face  of  might  they  upheld  the  right  of  the  Church  and  its 
representatives  to  command  obedience  and  respect.  The  Chris- 
tian priest  gradually  forced  the  barbarian  chief  to  do  his  will, 
though  at  times  he  refused  to  be  awed  into  submission,  murdered 
the  priest,  and  sacked  the  sacred  edifice.  That  the  Church  lost 
much  of  its  early  purity  of  worship,  and  adopted  many  practices 
fitted  to  the  needs  of  the  time,  but  not  consistent  with  real  reli- 


NEW  PEOPLES  IN  THE  EMPIRE  67 

gion,  there  can  be  no  question.  In  time  the  Church  gained  much 
from  the  mixture  of  these  new  peoples  among  the  old,  as  they 
infused  new  vigor  and  energy  into  the  blood  of  the  old  races,  but 
the  immediate  effect  was  quite  otherwise.  The  Church  itself  was 
paganized,  but  the  barbarians  were  in  time  Christianized. 

Priests  and  missionaries  went  among  the  heathen  tribes  and 
labored  for  their  conversion.  Of  course  the  leaders  were  sought 
out  first,  and  often  the  conversion  of  a  chieftain  was  made  by 
first  converting  his  wife.  After  the  chieftain  had  been  won  the 
minor  leaders  in  time  followed.  The  lesson  of  the  cross  was  pro- 
claimed, and  the  softening  and  restraining  influences  of  the  Chris- 
tian faith  were  exerted  on  the  barbarian.  It  was,  however,  a 
long  and  weary  road  to  restore  even  a  semblance  of  the  order 
and  respect  for  life  and  property  which  had  prevailed  under 
Roman  rule. 

Work  of  the  Church  during  the  Middle  Ages.  Everywhere 
throughout  the  old  Empire,  and-  far  into  the  forest  depths  of 
barbarian  lands,  went  bishops,  priests,  and  missionaries,  and 
there  parishes^  were  organized,  rude  churches  arose,  and  the 
process  of  educating  the  fighting  tribesmen  in  the  ways  of  civil- 
ized life  was  carried  out.  It  was  not  by  schools  of  learning,  but 
by  faith  and  ceremonial  that  the  Church  educated  and  guided  her 
children  into  the  type  she  approved.  Schools  for  other  than 
monks  and  clergy  for  a  time  were  not  needed,  and  such  practically 
died  out.  The  Church  and  its  offices  took  the  place  of  education 
and  exercised  a  wholesome  and  restraining  influence  over  both 
young  and  old  throughout  the  long  period  of  the  Middle  Ages. 
These  the  Church  in  time  taught  the  barbarian  to  respect.  The 
great  educational  work  of  the  Church  during  this  period  of  in- 
security and  ignorance  has  seldom  been  better  stated  than  in 
the  following  words  by  Draper: 

Of  the  great  ecclesiastics,  many  had  risen  from  the  humblest  ranks 
of  society,  and  these  men,  true  to  their  democratic  instincts,  were  often 
found  to  be  the  inflexible  supporters  of  right  against  might.  Eventu- 
ally coming  to  be  the  depositaries  of  the  knowledge  that  then  existed, 
they  opposed  intellect  to  brute  force,  in  many  instances  successfully, 
and  by  the  example  of  the  organization  of  the  Church,  which  was 
essentially  republican,  they  showed  how  representative  systems  may 
be  introduced  into  the  State.  Nor  was  it  over  communities  and  nations 
that  the  Church  displayed  her  chief  power.  Never  in  the  world  before 
was  there  such  a  system.  From  her  central  seat  at  Rome,  her  all- 
seeing  eye,  like  that  of  Proxndence  itsejf ,  could  equally  take  in  a  hemi- 
sphere at  a  glance,  or  examine  the  private  life  of  any  individual.    Her 


68         A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

boundless  influences  enveloped  kings  in  their  palaces,  and  relieved  the 
beggar  at  the  monastery  gate.  In  all  Europe  there  was  not  a  man  too 
obscure,  too  insignificant,  or  too  desolate  for  her.  Surrounded  by  her 
solemnities,  every  one  received  his  name  at  her  altar;  her  bells  chimed 
at  his  marriage,  her  knell  tolled  at  his  funeral.  She  extorted  from  him 
the  secrets  of  his  life  at  her  confessionals,  and  punished  his  faults  by 
her  penances.  In  his  hour  of  sickness  and  trouble  her  servants  sought 
him  out,  teaching  him,  by  her  exquisite  litanies  and  prayers,  to  place 
his  reliance  on  God,  or  strengthening  him  for  the  trials  of  life  by  the 
example  of  the  holy  and  just.  Her  prayers  had  an  efficacy  to  give 
repose  to  the  souls  of  his  dead.  When,  even  to  his  friends,  his  lifeless 
body  had  become  an  offense,  in  the  name  of  God  she  received  it  into 
her  consecrated  ground,  and  under  her  shadow  he  rested  till  the  great 
reckoning-day.  From  httle  better  than  a  slave  she  raised  his  wife  to 
be  his  equal,  and,  forbidding  him  to  have  more  than  one,  met  her  recom- 
pense for  those  noble  deeds  in  a  firm  friend  at  every  fireside.  Dis- 
countenancing all  impure  love,  she  put  round  that  fireside  the  children 
of  one  mother,  and  made  that  mother  little  less  than  sacred  in  their 
eyes.  In  ages  of  lawlessness  and  ra^dne,  among  people  but  a  step  above 
savages,  she  vindicated  the  inviolability  of  her  precincts  against  the 
hand  of  power,  and  made  her  temples  a  refuge  and  sanctuary  for  the 
despairing  and  oppressed.  Truly  she  was  the  shadow  of  a  great  rock 
in  many  a  weary  land. 

>  The  civilizing  work  of  the  monasteries.  No  less  important 
than  the  Church  and  its  clergy  was  the  work  of  the  monasteries 
and  their  monks  in  building  up  a  basis  for  a  new  civilization. 
These,  too,  were  founded  all  over  Europe.  To  make  a  map  of 
western  Europe  showing  the  monasteries  established  by  800  a.d. 
would  be  to  cover  the  map  with  a  series  of  dots.  The  importance 
of  their  work  is  better  understood  when  we  remember  that  the 
Germans  had  never  Hved  in  cities,  and  did  not  settle  in  them  on 
entering  the  Empire.  The  monasteries,  too,  were  seldom  estab- 
lished in  towns.  Their  sites  were  in  the  river  valleys  and  in  the 
forests  (R.  69),  and  the  monks  became  the  pioneers  in  clearing 
the  land  and  preparing  the  way  for  agriculture  and  civilization. 
Not  infrequently  a  swamp  was  taken  and  drained.  The  Middle- 
Age  period  was  essentially  a  period  of  settlement  of  the  land  and 
of  agricultural  development,  and  the  monks  lived  on  the  land 
and  among  a  people  just  passing  through  the  earliest  stages  of 
settled  and  civilized  life.  In  a  way  the  inheritors  of  the  agricul- 
tural and  handicraft  knowledge  of  the  Romans,  the  monks  be- 
came the  most  skillful  artisans  and  farmers  to  be  foimd,  and  from 
them  these  arts  in  time  reached  the  developing  peasantry  around 
them.  Their  work  and  services  have  been  well  summed  up  by 
the  same  author  just  quoted,  as  follows: 


NEW  PEOPLES  IN  THE  EMPIRE  69 

It  was  mainly  by  the  monasteries  that  to  the  peasant  class  of  Europe 
was  pointed  out  the  way  of  ci\'iUzation.  The  devotions  and  charities; 
the  austerities  of  the  brethren;  their  abstemious  meal;  their  meager 
clothing,  the  cheapest  of  the  country  in  which  they  Uved ;  their  shaven 
heads,  or  the  cowl  which  shut  out  the  sight  of  sinful  objects;  the  long 
staff  in  their  hands;  their  naked  feet  and  legs;  their  passing  forth  on 
their  journeys  by  twos,  each  a  watch  on  his  brother;  the  prohibitions 
against  eating  outside  of  the  wall  of  the  monastery,  which  had  its  own 
mill,  its  own  bakehouse,  and  whatever  was  needed  in  an  abstemious 
domestic  economy ;  their  silent  hospitality  to  the  wayfarer,  who  was 
refreshed  in  a  separate  apartment;  the  lands  around  their  buildings 
turned  from  a  wilderness  into  a  garden,  and,  above  all,  labor  exalted 
and  ennobled  by  their  holy  hands,  and  celibacy,  forever,  in  the  eye  of 
the  vulgar,  a  proof  of  separation  from  the  world  and  a  sacrifice  to 
heaven  —  these  were  the  things  that  arrested  the  attention  of  the  bar- 
barians of  Europe,  and  led  them  on  to  civilization. 

The  problem  faced  by  the  Middle  Ages.  That  the  lamp  of 
learning  burned  low  during  this  period  of  assimilation  is  no  cause 
for  wonder.  Recovery  from  such  a  deluge  of  barbarism  on  a 
weakened  society  is  not  easy.  In  fact  the  recovery  was  a  long 
and  slow  process,  occupying  nearly  the  whole  of  a  thousand  years»J|f 
The  problem  which  faced  the  Church,  as  the  sole  surviving  force 
capable  of  exerting  any  constructive  influence,  was  that  of  chang- 
ing the  barbarism  and  anarchy  of  the  sixth  century,  with  its  low 
standards  of  living  and  lack  of  humane  ideals,  into  the  intelligent, 
progressive  civilization  of  the  fifteenth  century.  This  was  the 
work  of  the  Middle  Ages,  and  largely  the  work  of  the  Christian 
Church.  It  was  not  a  period  of  progress,  but  one  of  assimilation, 
so  that  a  common  western  civilization  might  in  time  be  developed 
out  of  the  diverse  and  hostile  elements  mixed  together  by  the  rude 
force  of  circumstances. 

QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

■^   I.  Do  the  peculiar  problems  of  assimilation  of  the  foreign-bom,  revealed  to 
us  by  the  World  War,  put  us  in  a  somewhat  similar  position  to  Rome 
\  under  the  Empire  as  relates  to  the  need  of  a  guiding  national  faith? 

2.  Outline  how  Rome  might  have  been  helped  and  strengthened  by  a 
\  national  school  system  under  state  control. 

3.  Outline  how  our  state  school  systems  could  be  made  much  more  effective 
as  national  instruments  by  the  infusion  into  their  instruction  of  a  strong 
national  faith. 

4.  Try  to  picture  the  results  upon  our  civilization  had  western  Europe 
become  Mohammedan. 

5.  The  movement  of  new  peoples  into  the  Roman  Empire  was  much  slower 
than  has  been  the  immigration  of  foreign  peoples  into  the  United  States, 
since  1840.    Why  the  difference  in  assimilative  power? 


70  A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

6.  How  do  you  think  the  Roman  provinces  and  Italy,  after  the  tribes  from 
the  North  had  settled  down  within  the  Empire,  compared  with  Mexico 
after  the  years  of  revolution  with  peons  and  brigands  in  control?  With 
Russia,  after  the  destruction  wrought  by  the  Bolshevists? 

7.  Explain  the  importance  of  the  long  civilizing  and  educating  work  of 
Rome  among  the  German  tribes,  in  preparing  the  means  for  the  preserva- 
tion of  Roman  institutions  after  the  downfall  of  the  Roman  govern- 
ment. 

8.  What  does  the  fact  that  Roman  institutions  and  Roman  thinking  con- 
tinued and  profoundly  modified  mediaeval  life  indicate  as  to  the  nature 
of  Roman  government  and  the  Roman  power  of  assimilation? 

g.  Though  Rome  never  instituted  a  state  school  system,  was  there  not 
after  all  large  educational  work  done  by  the  government  through  its 
intelligent  administration? 

10.  Show  how  the  breakdown  of  Roman  government  and  Roman  institutions 
was  naturally  more  complete  in  Gaul  than  in  northern  Italy,  and  more 
complete  in  northern  than  in  central  or  southern  Italy,  and  hence  how 
Roman  civilization  was  naturally  preserved  in  larger  measure  in  the 
cities  of  Italy  than  elsewhere. 

11.  Show  how  the  Christian  Church,  too,  could  not  have  completely  dis- 
pensed with  Roman  letters  and  Roman  civilization,  had  it  desired  to  do 
so,  but  was  forced  of  necessity  to  preserve  and  pass  on  important  portions 
of  the  civilization  of  Rome. 

12.  What  do  you  think  would  have  been  the  effect  on  the  future  of  civiliza- 
tion had  the  barbarian  tribes  overrun  Spain,  Italy,  and  Greece  during 
the  Age  of  Pericles? 

13.  What  modern  analogies  do  we  have  to  the  civilizing  work  of  the  monks 
and  clergy  during  the  Middle  Ages? 

14.  Picture  the  work  of  the  monasteries  in  handing  on  to  western  Europe 
the  arts  and  handicrafts  and  skilled  occupations  of  Rome.  Cite  some 
examples. 

15.  What  civihzing  problem,  somewhat  comparable  to  that  of  barbarian 
Europe,  have  we  faced  in  our  national  history?  Why  have  we  been 
able  to  obtain  results  so  much  more  rapidly?  '  ^  k'^  ;*/  ^t  ■  •  - 

[      r' 

SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  selections  are  repro- 
duced: 

46.  Caesar:  The  Hunting  Germans  and  their  Fighting  Ways. 

47.  Tacitus:  The  Germans  and  their  Domestic  Habits. 

.  48.  Dill:  Effect  on  the  Roman  World  of  the  News  of  the  Sacking  of  Rome 
by  Alaric. 

49.  Giry  and  Reville:  Fate  of  the  Old  Roman  Towns. 

50.  Kingsley:  The  Invaders,  and  what  they  brought. 

51.  General  Form  for  a  Grant  of  Immunity  to  a  Bishop. 

52.  Charlemagne:  Powers  and  Immunities  granted  to  the  Monastery  of 
Saint  Marcellus. 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

*  Adams,  G.  B.  Civilization  during  the  Middle  Ages. 
Church,  R.  W.  The  Beginnings  of  the  Middle  Ages. 
Kingsley,  Chas.     The  Roman  and  Teuton. 

*  Thorndike,  Lynn.    History  of  Medieval  Europe. 


Ca^  f-^^ 


^  [^  f -te'-  y^^^"^ 


[£,,^0^^/^^^^  ^  Chapter  vi  'j^^^'  ^^  ^^^ 

EDUCATION  DURING  THE  EARLY  MIDDLE  AGES » 

I.  CONDITION  AND  PRESERVATION  OF  LEARNING 

The  low  intellectual  level.  As  was  stated  in  the  preceding 
chapter,  the  lamp  of  learning  burned  low  throughout  the  most  of 
western  Europe  during  the  period  of  assimilation  and  partial 
civilization  of  the  barbarian  tribes.  The  western  portion  of  the 
Roman  Empire  had  been  overrun,  and  rude  Germanic  chieftains 
were  estabUshing,  by  the  law  of  might,  new  kingdoms  on  the 
ruins  of  the  old.  The  Germanic  tribes  had  no  intellectual  Ufe  of 
their  own  to  contribute,  and  no  intellectual  tastes  to  be  ministered 
imto.  With  the  destruction  of  cities  and  towns  and  country 
villas,  with  their  artistic  and  literary  collections,  much  that  repre- 
sented the  old  culture  was  obliterated,  and  books  became  more 
and  more  scarce.  The  destruction  was  gradual,  but  by  the  be- 
ginning of  the  seventh  centurj^  the  loss  had  become  great.  The 
Roman  schools  also  gradually  died  out  as  .the  need  for  an  educa- 
tion which  prepared  for  government  and  gave  a  knowledge  of 
Roman  law  passed  away,  and  the  type  of  education  approved  by 
the  Church  was  left  in  complete  control  of  the  field.  As  the 
security  and  leisure  needed  for  study  disappeared,  and  as  the  only 
use  for  learning  was  now  in  the  service  of  the  Church,  education 
became  limited  to  the  narrow  lines  which  offered  such  preparation 
and  to  the  few  who  needed  it.  Amid  the  ruins  of  the  ancient  civili- 
zation the  Church  stood  as  the  only  conservative  and  regenera- 
tive force,  and  naturally  what  learning  remained  passed  into  its 
hands  and  under  its  control. 

The  result  of  all  these  influences  and  happenings  was  that  by 
the  beginning  of  the  seventh  century  Christian  Europe  had 
reached  a  very  low  intellectual  level,  and  during  the  seventh  and 
eighth  centuries  conditions  grew  worse  instead  of  better.  Only 
in  England  and  Ireland,  as  will  be  pointed  out  a  Uttle  later,  and 
in  a  few  Itahan  cities,  was  there  anything  of  consequence  of  the 
old  Roman  learning  preserved.  On  the  Continent  there  was  little 
general  learning,  even  among  the  clergy  (R.  64  a).  Many  of  the 
^  From  the  sixth  to  the  twelfth  centuries. 


72  A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

priests  were  woefully  ignorant,  and  the  Latin  writings  of  the  time 
contain  many  inaccuracies  and  corruptions  which  reveal  the  low 
standard  of  learning  even  among  the  better  educated  of  the 
clerical  class.  The  Church  itself  was  seriously  afifected  by  the 
prevailing  ignorance  of  the  period,  and  incorporated  into  its  sys- 
tem of  government  and  worship  many  barbarous  customs  and 
practices  of  which  it  was  a  long  time  in  ridding  itself.  So  great 
had  become  the  ignorance  and  superstition  of  the  time,  among 
priests,  monks,  and  the  people;  so  much  had  religion  taken  on 
the  worship  of  saints  and  relics  and  shrines;  and  so  much  had 
the  Church  developed  the  sensuous  and  symbolic,  that  religion 
had  in  reality  become  a  crude  polytheism  instead  of  the  simple 
monotheistic  faith  of  the  early  Church.  Along  scientific  lines 
especially  the  loss  was  very  great.  Scientific  ideas  as  to  natu- 
ral phenomena  disappeared,  and  crude  and  childish  ideas  as  to 
natural  forces  came  to  prevail.  As  if  barbarian  chiefs  and  rob- 
ber bands  were  not  enough,  popular  imagination  peopled  the 
world  with  demons,  goblins,  and  dragons,  and  all  sorts  of  super- 
stitions and  supernatural  happenings  were  recorded.  Intercom- 
munication largely  ceased;  trade  and  commerce  died  out;  the 
accumulated  wealth  of  the  past  was  destroyed;  and  the  old 
knowledge  of  the  kn(3wn  world  became  badly  distorted,  as  is 
evidenced  by  the  many  crude  mediaeval  maps.  The  only  scholar- 
ship of  the  time,  if  such  it  might  be  called,  was  the  little  needed 
by  the  Church  to  provide  for  and  maintain  its  government  and 
worship.  Almost  everything  that  we  to-day  mean  by  civiliza- 
tion in  that  age  was  found  within  the  protecting  walls  of  mon- 
astery or  church,  and  these  institutions  were  at  first  too  busy 
building  up  the  foundations  upon  which  a  future  culture  might 
rest  to  spend  much  time  in  preserving  learning,  much  less  in 
advancing  it. 

The  monasteries  develop  schools.  In  this  age  of  perpetual  law- 
lessness and  disorder  the  one  opportunity  for  a  life  of  repose  and 
scholarly  contemplation  lay  in  the  monasteries.  Here  the  rule 
of  might  and  force  was  absent  (R.  52),  and  the  timid,  the  devout, 
and  the  studiously  inclined  here  found  a  refuge  from  the  turbu- 
lence and  brutality  of  a  rude  civiHzation.  The  early  monasteries, 
and  especially  the  monastery  of  Saint  Victor,  at  Marseilles, 
founded  by  Cassian  in  404,  had  represented  a  culmination  of  the 
western  feehng  of  antagonism  to  all  ancient  learning,  but  with  the 
founding  of  Monte  Cassino  by  Saint  Benedict,  in  529  a.d.,  and 


PRESERVATION  OF  LEARNING  73 

the  promulgation  of  the  Benedictme  rule  (R.  43),  a  more  liberal 
attitude  was  shown.  This  rule  was  adopted  generally  by  the 
monasteries  throughout  what  is  now  Italy,  Spain,  France,  Ger- 
many, and  England,  and  the/Benedictine  became  the  type  for  the 


Fig.  15.  a  Typical  Monastery  of  Southern  Europe 

monks  of  the  early  Middle  Ages.,'  To  this  order  we  are  largely 
indebted  for  the  copying  of  books  and  the  preservation  of  learning 
throughout  the  mediaeval  period. 

The  48th  rule  of  Saint  Benedict,  it  will  be  remembered  (R.  43), 
had  imposed  reading  and  study  as  a  part  of  the  daily  duty  of 
every  monk,  but  had  said  nothing  about  schools.  Subsequent 
regulations  issued  by  superiors  had  aimed  at  the  better  enforce- 
ment of  this  rule  (R.  44),  that  the  monks  might  lead  devout  lives 
and  know  the  Bible  and  the  sacred  writings  of  the  Church.  Im- 
posed at  first  as  a  matter  of  education  and  discipline  for  the  monks, 
(tills  rule  ultimately  led  to  the  establishment  of  schools  and  the 
development  of  a  system  of  monastic  instruction.  As  youths 
were  received  at  an  early  age  into  the  monasteries  to  prepare  for 
a  monastic  life,  it  was  necessary  that  they  be  taught  to  read  if 
they  were  later  to  use  the  sacred  books.  This  led  to  the  duty  of 
instructing  novices,  which  marks  the  beginning  of  monastic  in- 
struction for  those  within  the  walls.  As  books  were  scarce  and  at 
the  same  time  necessary,  and  the  only  way  to  get  new  ones  was  to 
copy  from  old  ones,  the  monasteries  were  soon  led  to  take  up  the 
work  once  carried  on  by  the  publishing  houses  of  ancient  Rome, 
and  in  much  the  same  way.  This  made  writing  necessar>%  and 
the  novices  had  to  be  instructed  carefully  in  this,  as  well  as  in 
reading.  The  chants  and  music  of  the  Church  called  for  in- 
struction of  the  novices  in  music,  and  the  celebration  of  Easter 
and  the  fast  and  festival  days  of  the  Church  called  for  some  rudi- 
mentary instruction  in  numbers  and  calculation. 


74  A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

Out  of  these  needs  rose  the  monastery  school,  the  copying  of 
manuscripts,  and  the  preservation  of  books.  Due  to  their 
greater  security  and  quiet  the  monasteries  became  the  leading 
teaching  institutions  of  the  early  part  of  the  Middle-Age  period, 
and  those  who  wished  their  children  trained  for  the  service  of  the 
Church  gave  them  to  the  monasteries  (R.  53  a).  The  develop- 
ment of  the  monastic  schools  was  largely  voluntary,  though  from 
an  early  date  bishops  and  rulers  began  urging  the  monasteries  to 
open  schools  f&r  boys  in  connection  with  their  houses,  and  schools 
became  in  time  a  regular  feature  of  the  monastic  organization. 
From  schools  only  for  those  intending  to  take  the  vows  (oblaii)^ 
the  instruction  was  gradually  opened,  after  the  ninth  century, 
to  others  (externi)  not  intending  to  take  the  vows,  and  what  came 
to  be  known  as  ''outer"  monastic  schools  were  in  time  developed. 

The  monasteries  became  the  preservers  of  learning.  Another 
need  developed  the  copying  of  pagan  books,  and  incidentally  the 
preservation  of  some  of  the  best  of  Roman  literature.  The  lan- 
guage of  the  Church  very  naturally  was  Latin,  as  it  was  a  direct 
descendant  of  Roman  life,  governmental  organization,  citizenship, 
and  education.  The  writings  of  the  Fathers  of  the  Western 
Church  had  all  been  in  Latin,  and  in  the  fourth  century  the  Bible 
had  been  translated  from  the  Greek  into  the  Latin.  This  edition, 
known  as  the  Vulgate  Bible,  became  the  standard  for  western 
Europe  for  ten  <:enturies  to  come.  YThe  German  tribes  which 
had  invaded  the  Empire  had  no  written  languages  of  their  own, 
and  their  spoken  dialects  differed  much  from  the  Latin  speech  of 
those  whom  they  had  conquered.  Latin  was  thus  the  language 
of  all  those  of  education,  and  naturally  continued  as  the  language 
of  the  Church  and  the  monastery  for  both  speech  and  writing. 
All  books  were,  of  course,  written  in  Latin. 

Under  the  rude  influences  and  the  general  ignorance  of  the 
period,  though,  the  language  was  easily  and  rapidly  corrupted, 
and  it  became  necessary  for  the  monasteries  and  the  churches  to 
have  good  models  of  Latin  prose  and  verse  to  refer  to.  These 
were  best  found  in  the  old  Latin  literary  authors  —  particularly 
Caesar,  Cicero,  and  Vergil.  To  have  these,  due  to  the  great 
destruction  of  old  books  which  had  taken  place  during  the  inter- 
vening centuries,  it  was  necessary  to  copy  these  authors,  as  well 
as  the  Psalter,  the  Missal,  the  sacred  books,  and  the  writings  of 
the  Fathers  of  the  Church  (Rs.  55,  56).  It  thus  happened  that 
the  monasteries  unintentionally  began  to  preserve  and  use  the 


PRESERVATION  OF  LEARNING 


75 


Fig.  i6.  Charlemagne's  Empire,  and  the  Important  Monasteries 

OF  THE  Time 
Charlemagne's  empire  at  his  death  is  shaded  darker  than  other  parts  of  the  map 

ancient  Roman  books,  and  from  using  them  at  first  as  models  for 
style,  an  interest  in  their  contents  was  later  awakened.  While 
many  of  the  monasteries  remained  as  farming,  charitable,  and 
ascetic  institutions  almost  exclusively,  and  were  never  noted  for 
their  educational  work,  a  small  but  increasing  number  gradually 
accumulated  libraries  and  became  celebrated  for  their  literary 
activity  and  for  the  character  of  their  instruction.  The  monas- 
teries thus  in  time  became  the  storehouses  of  learning,  the  pub- 
lishing houses  of  the  Middle  Ages  (Rs.  54,  55,  56),  teaching 
institutions  of  first  importance,  and  centers  of  literary  activity 
and  reHgious  thought,  as  well  as  centers  for  agricultural  develop- 
ment, work  in  the  arts  and  crafts,  and  Christian  hospitality. 
Many  developed  into  large  and  important  institutions  (R.  69). 


76  A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

The  convents  and  their  schools.  The  early  part  of  the  Middle 
Ages  also  witnessed  a  remarkable  development  of  convents  for 
women,  these  receiving  a  special  development  in  Germanic  lands. 
Filled  with  the  same  aggressive  spirit  as  the  men,  but  softened 
somewhat  by  Christianity,  many  women  of  high  station  among 
the  German  tribes  founded  convents  and  developed  institutions 
of  much  renown. '  This  provided  a  rather  superior  class  of  women 
as  organizers  and  directors,  and  a  conventual  life  continued, 
throughout  the  entire  Middle  Ages,  to  attract  an  excellent  class 
of  women.  This  wiU  be  understood  when  it  is  remembered  that 
a  conventual  life  offered  to  women  of  intellectual  abihty  and  schol- 
arly tastes  the  one  opportunity  for  an  education  and  a  life  of 
learning.  The  convents,  too,  \yere  much  earlier  and  much  more 
extensively  opened  for  instruction  to  those  not  intending  to  take 
the  vows  than  was  the  case  with  the  monasteries,  and,  in  conse- 
quence, it  became  a  common  practice  throughout  the  Middle 
Ages,  just  as  it  is  to-day  among  Catholic  families,  to  send  girls  to 
the  convent  for  education  and  for  training  in  manners  and  religion. 
Many  well-trained  women  were  produced  in  the  convents  of 
Europe  in  the  period  from  the  sixth  to  the  thirteenth  centuries^ 

The  instruction  consisted  of  reading,  writing,  and  copying 
Latin,  as  in  the  monasteries,  as  well  as  music,  weaving  and  spin- 
ning, and  needlework.  Weaving  and  spinning  had  an  obvious 
utilitarian  purpose,  and  needlework,  in  addition  to  necessary 
sewing,  was  especially  useful  in  the  production  of  altar-cloths  and 
sacred  vestments.  The  copying  and  illuminating  of  manuscripts, 
music,  and  embroidering  made  a  special  appeal  to  women  (R.  56), 
and  some  of  the  most  beautifully  copied  and  illuminated  manu- 
scripts of  the  mediaeval  period  are  products  of  their  skill.  Their 
contribution  to  music  and  art,  as  it  influenced  the  life  of  the  time, 
was  also  large.  The  convent  schools  reached  their  highest  devel- 
opment about  the  middle  of  the  thirteenth  century,  after  which 
they  began  to  decline  in  importance. 

The  cathedral  school  at  York.  One  of  the  schools  which  early 
attained  fame  was  the  cathedral  school  at  York,  in  northern  Eng- 
land. This  had,  by  the  middle  of  the  eighth  century,  come  to 
possess  for  the  time  a  large  library,  and  contained  most  of  the 
important  Latin  authors  and  textbooks  then  known  (R.  61).  In 
this  school,  under  the  scholasticus  ^Elbert,  was  trained  a  youth  by 
the  name  of  Alcuin,  bom  in  or  near  York,  about  735  a. d.  In  a 
poem  describing  the  school  (R.  60),  he  gives  a  good  portrayal 


1 


t> 


PRESERVATION  OF  LEARNING  77 

of  the  instruction  he  received,  telling  how  the  learned  ^Elbert 
"moistened  thirsty  hearts  with  diverse  streams  of  teaching  and 
the  varied  dews  of  learning,"  and  sorted  out  ''youths  of  conspicu- 
ous intelligence"  to  whom  he  gave  special  attention.  Alcuin 
afterward  succeeded  ^Elbert  as  scholasticus,  and  wa  s  widely  known 
as  a  gifted  teacher.  Well  aware  of  the  precarious  condition  of 
learning  amid  such  a  rude  and  uncouth  society,  he  handed  on  to 
his  pupils  the  learning  he  had  received,  and  imbued  them  with 
something  of  his  own  love  for  it  and  his  anxiety  for  its  preserva- 
tion and  advancement.  It  was  this  Alcuin  who  was  soon  to  give 
a  new  impetus  to  the  development  of  schools  and  the  preservation 
of  learning  in  Frankland. 

Charlemagne  and  Alcuin.  In  768  there  came  to  the  throne  as 
king  of  the  great  Prankish  nation  one  of  the  most  distinguished 
and  capable  rulers  of  all  time  —  a  man  who  would  have  been  a 
commanding  personality  in  any  age  or  land.  His  ancestors  had 
developed  a  great  kingdoni,  and  it  was  his  grandfather  who  had 
severely  defeated  the  Saracens  at  Tours  and  driven  them  back 
over  the  Pyrenees  into  Spain.  This  man  Charlemagne  easily 
stands  outfas  one  of  the  greatest  figures  of  all  history.  For  five 
hundred  years  before  andafter  him  there  is  no  ruler  who  matched 
him  in  insight,  force,  or  executive  capacity,  j  He  is  particularly 
the  dominating  figure  of  mediaeval  times.  Bom  in  an  age  of  law- 
lessness and  disorder,  he  used  every  effort  to  civilize  and  rule  as 
intelligently  as  possible  the  great  Prankish  kingdom  .j 

Realizing  better  than  did  his  bishops  and  abbots  the  need  for 
educational  facilities  for  the  nobles  and  clergy,  he  early  turned 
his  attention  to  securing  teachers  capable  of  giving  the  needed 
instruction.  These,  though,  were  scarce  and  hard  to  obtain. 
After  two  imsuccessful  efforts  to  obtain  a  master  scholar  to  be- 
come, as  it  were,  his  minister  of  education,  he  finally  succeeded 
in  drawing  to  his  court  perhaps  the  greatest  scholar  and  teacher 
^  in  all  England.]  At  Parma,  in  northern  Italy,  Charlemagne  met 
VAlcuin,  in  781,  and  invited  him  to  leave  York  for  Prankland. 
After  obtaining  the  consent  of  his  archbishop  and  king,  Alcuin 
accepted,  and  arrived,  with  three  assistants,  at  Charlemagne's 
court,  in  782,  to  take  up  the  work  of  educational  propaganda  in 
Prankland. 

The  plight  in  which  he  found  learning  was  most  deplorable, 
presenting  a  marked  contrast  to  conditions  in  England. '  Learning 
had  been  almost  obliterated  during  the  two  centuries  of  wild  dis- 


78         A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

order  from  600  on.  From  600  to  850  has  often  been  called  the 
darkest  period  of  the  Dark  Ages,  and  Alcuin  arrived  when  Frank- 
land  was  at  its  worst.  The  monastic  and  cathedral  schools  which 
had  been  established  earlier  had  in  large  part  been  broken  up, 
and  the  monasteries  had  become  places  for  the  pensioning  of  royal 
favorites  and  hence  had  lost  their  earlier  religious  zeal  and  effec- 
tiveness. The  abbots  and  bishops  possessed  but  little  learning, 
and  the  lower  clergy,  recruited  largely  from  bondmen,  were  grossly 
ignorant,  greatly  to  the  injury  of  the  Church.  The  copying  of 
books  had  almost  ceased,  and  learning  was  slowly  dying  out. 

The  palace  school.  There  had  for  some  time  been  a  form  of 
school  connected  with  the  royal  court,  known  as  the  palace  school, 
though  the  study  of  letters  had  played  but  a  small  part  in  it.  To 
the  reorganization  of  this  school  Alcuin  first  addressed  himself, 
introducing  into  it  elementary  instruction  in  that  learning  of 
which  he  was  so  fond.  The  school  included  the  princes  and 
princesses  of  the  royal  household,  relatives,  attaches,  courtiers, 
and,  not  least  in  importance  as  pupils,  the  king  and  queen.  To 
meet  the  needs  of  such  a  heterogeneous  circle  was  no  easy  task. 

The  instruction  which  Alcuin  provided  for  the  younger 
members  of  the  circle  was  largely  of  the  question  and  answer 
(catechetical)  type,  both  questions  and  answers  being  prepared 
by  Alcuin  beforehand  and  learned  by  the  pupils.  Fortunately 
examples  of  Alcuin 's  instruction  have  been  preserved  to  us  in 
a  dialogue  prepared  for  the  instruction  of  Pepin,  a  son  of  Charle- 
magne, then  sixteen  years  old  (R.  62).  With  the  older  mem- 
bers the  questions  and  answers  were  oral.  For  all,  though,  the 
instruction  was  of  a  most  elementary  nature,  ranging  over  the 
elements  of  the  subjects  of  instruction  of  the  time.  Poetry,  arith- 
metic, astronomy,  the  writings  of  the  Fathers,  and  theology  are 
mentioned  as  having  been  studied.  Charlemagne  learned  to  read 
Latin,  but  is  said  never  to  have  mastered  the  art  of  writing. 

Charlemagne's  proclamations  on  education.  After  reorganiz- 
ing the  palace  school,  Alcuin  and  Charlemagne  turned  their 
attention  to  the  improvement  of  education  among  the  monks  and 
clergy  throughout  the  realm.  The  first  important  service  was 
the  preparation  and  sending  out  of  a  carefully  collected  and 
edited  series  of  sermons  to  the  churches  containing, ''  in  two  vol- 
umes, lessons  suitable  for  the  whole  year  and  for  each  separate 
festival,  and  free  from  error."  These  Charlemagne  ordered  used 
in  the  churches  (R.  63).     He  also  says,  **we  have  striven  with 


PRESERVATION  OF  LEARNING  79 

watchful  zeal  to  advance  the  cause  of  leammg,  which  has  been 
almost  forgotten  by  the  negligence  of  our  ancestors;  and,  by  our 
example,  also  we  invite  those  whom  we  can  to  master  the  study 
of  the  liberal  arts,"  meaning  thereby  to  incite  the  bishops  and 
clergy  to  a  study  of  the  learning  of  the  mediaeval  time.  The  vol- 
umes and  letter  were  sent  out  in  786,  four  years  after  Alcuin's 
arrival  at  the  court.  Further  to  aid  in  the  revival  of  learning, 
Charlemagne,  in  787,  imported  a  number  of  monks  from  Italy, 
who  were  capable  of  giving  instruction  in  arithmetic,  singing,  and 
grammar,  and  sent  them  to  the  principal  monasteries  to  teach. 

In  787  the  first  general  proclamation  on  education  of  the 
Middle  Ages  was  issued  (R.  64  a),  and  from  it  we  can  infer  much 
as  to  the  state  of  learning  among  the  monks  and  clergy  of  the  time. 
\  In  this  document  the  king  gently  reproves  the  abbots  of  his  realm 
for  their  illiteracy,  and  exhorts  them  to  the  study  of  letters.,  The 
signature  is  Charlemagne's,  but  the  hand  is  Alcuin's.  In  it  he 
tells  the  abbots,  in  commenting  on  the  fact  that  they  had  sent 
letters  to  him  telling  him  that  "sacred  and  pious  prayers"  were 
being  offered  in  his  behalf,  that  he  recognized  in  "most  of  these 
letters  both  correct  thoughts  and  uncouth  expressions;  because 
what  pious  devotion  dictated  faithfully  to  the  mind,  the  tongue, 
uneducated  on  account  of  the  neglect  of  study,  was  not  able  to 
express  in  a  letter  without  error."  He  therefore  commands  the 
abbots  neither  to  neglect  the  study  of  letters,  if  they  wish  to  have 
his  favor,  nor  to  fail  to  send  copies  of  his  letter  "to  all  your  suf- 
fragans and  fellow  bishops,  and  to  all  the  monasteries."  Two 
years  later  (789)  Charlemagne  supplemented  this  by  a  further 
general  admonition  (R.  64  b)  to  the  ministers  and  clergy  of  his 
realm,^  exhorting  them  to  live  clean  and  just  lives,  and  closing 
with:^ 

And  let  schools  be  established  in  which  boys  may  leam  to  read. 
Correct  carefully  the  Psalms,  the  signs  in  writing,  the  songs,  the  calen- 
dar, the  grammar,  in  each  monastery  and  bishopric,  and  the  catholic 
book;  because  often  some  desire  to  pray  to  God  properly,  but  they  pray 
badly  because  of  incorrect  books. 

Effect  of  the  work  of  Charlemagne  and  Alcuin.  The  actual 
results  of  the  work  of  Charlemagne  and  Alcuin  were,  after  all, 
rather  meager.  The  difficulties  they  faced  are  almost  beyond  our 
comprehension.  Nobles  and  clergy  were  alike  ignorant  and  un- 
couth. There  seemed  no  place  to  begin.  It  may  be  said  that  by 
Charlemagne's  work  he  greatly  widened  the  area  of  civilization, 


8o 


A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


created  a  new  Frankish-Roman  Empire  to  be  the  inheritor  of  the 
civilization  and  culture  of  the  old  one,  checked  the  decline  in 
learning  and  reawakened  a  desire  for  study,  and  that  he  began  the 
substitution  of^ideasjfor  might  as  a  ruling  force  among  the  tribes 
under  his  rule.  That  for  a  time  he  gave  an  important  impetus 
to  the  study  of  letters,  which  resulted  in  a  real  revival  in  the  edu- 
cational work  of  some  of  the  monasteries  and  cathedral  schools, 
seems  certain.  Men  knew  more  of  books  and  wrote  better  Latin 
than  before,  and  those  who  wished  to  learn  found  it  easier  to  do 
so.  (^The  state  of  society  and  the  condition  of  the  times,  however, 
were  against  any  large  success  for  such  an  ambitious  educational 
undertaking,  and  after  the  death  of  Charlemagne,  the  division  of 
"Hiis  empire,  and  the  invasions  of  the  Northmen,  education  slowly 
declined  again,  though  never  to  quite  the  level  it  had  reached 
when  Charlemagne  came  to  the  thronel  In  a  few  schools  there  was 
no  decline,  and  these  became  the  centers  of  learning  of  the  future. 

New  invasions; 
the  Northmen.  Five 
years  after  Alcuin 
went  to  Frankland 
to  help  Charle- 
magne revive  learn- 
ing in  his  kingdom, 
a  fresh  series  of  bar- 
barian invasions  be- 
gan with  the  raiding 
of  the  English  coast 
by  the  Danes.  In 
raid  after  raid,  ex- 
tending over  nearly 
a  hundred  years, 
these  Danes  grad- 
ually overran  all  of 
eastern  and  central 
England  from  Lon- 
don north  to  beyond 
Whitby,  plundering 
and  burning  the 
churches  and  mon- 
asteries, and  de- 
By  the  Peace  of  Wed- 


FiG.  17.  Where  the  Danes  ravaged  England 
stroying  books  and  learning  everywhere. 


PRESERVATION  OF  LEARNING  8i 

more,  effected  by  King  Alfred  in  878,  the  Danes  were  finally 
given  about  one  half  of  England,  and  in  return  agreed  to  settle 
down  and  accept  Christianity, 

Work  of  Alfred  in  England.  The  set-back  to  learning  caused  by 
this  latest  deluge  of  barbarism  was  a  serious  one,  ^nd  one  from 
which  the  land  did  not  recover  for  a  long  time.  '  In  northern 
Frankland  and  in  England  the  results  were  disastrous.  The 
revival  which  Charlemagne  had  started  was  checked,  and  England 
did  not  recover  from  the  blow  for  centuries.^  Even  in  the  parts 
of  England  not  invaded  and  pillaged,  education  sadly  declined 
as  a  result  of  nearly  a  century  of  struggle  against  the  invaders 
(R.  66).  Alfred,  known  to  history  as  Alfred  the  Great,  who  ruled 
as  English  king  from  871  to  901,;  made  great  efforts  to  revive 
learning  in  his  kingdom.  Probably  inspired  by  the  example  of  ■ 
Charlemagne,  he  established  a  large  palace  school  (R.  68),  to  the 
support  of  which  he  devoted  one^ eighth  of  his  income;  he  imported 
scholars  from  Mercia  and  Frankland  (R.  67);  restored  many 
monasteries;  and  tried  hard  to  revive  schools  and  encourage 
learning  throughout  his  realm,  and  with  some  success.  With 
the  great  decay  of  the  Latin  learning  he  tried  to  encourage  the 
use  of  the  native  Anglo-Saxon  language,  and  to  this  end  trans- 
lated books  from  Latin  into  Anglo-Saxon  for  his  people,  j 

In  the  preceding  chapter  and  in  this  one  we  have  traced  briefly 
the  great  invasions,  or  migrations,  which  took  place  in  western 
Europe,  and  indicated  somewhat  the  great  destruction  they 
wrought  within  the  bounds  of  the  old  Empire.  In  this  chapter 
we  have  traced  the  beginnings  of  Christian  schools  to  replace  the 
ones  destroyed,  the  preservation  of  learning  in  the  monasteries, 
and  the  efforts  of  Charlemagne  and  Alfred  to  revive  learning  in 
their  kingdoms.  In  the  chapter  which  follows  we  shall  describe 
the  mediaeval  system  of  education  as  it  had  evolved  by  the 
twelfth  century,  after  which  we  shall  be  ready  to  pass  to  the 
beginnings  of  that  Revival  of  Learning  which  ultimately  resulted 
in  the  rediscovery  of  the  learning  of  the  ancient  world.      _^  ^ 

QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

1.  Picture  the  gradual  dying-out  of  Roman  learning  in  the  Western  Empire, 
I    Y      and  explain  why  pagan  schools  and  learning  lingered  longer  in  Britain, 

'^       Ireland,  and  Italy  than  elsewhere. 

2.  At  what  time  was  the  old  Roman  civilization  and  learning  most  nearly 
xs,j        extinct? 

Cj   3.  Explain  how  the  monasteries  were  forced  to  develop  schools  to  maintain 
any  intellectual  life. 


82  A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

4.  Explain  how  the  copying  of  manuscripts  led  to  further  educational 
development  in  the  monasteries. 

5.  Would  the  convents  have  tended  to  attract  a  higher  quality  of  women 
than  the  monasteries  did  of  men?     Why? 

6.  Explain  why  Greek  was  known  longer  in  Ireland  and  Britain  than  else- 
where in  the  West. 

7.  What  light  is  thrown  on  the  conditions  of  the  civilization  of  the  time  by 
the  small  permanent  success  of  the  efforts  of  Charlemagne,  looking  toward 
a  revival  of  learning  in  Frankland? 

8.  Explain  how  Latin  came  naturally  to  be  the  language  of  the  Church, 
and  of  scholarship  in  western  Europe  throughout  all  the  Middle  Ages. 

SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  are  reproduced: 

53.  Migne:  Forms  used  in  connection  with  monastery  life: 

(a)  Form  for  offering  a  Child  to  a  Monastery. 
lb)  The  Monastic  Vow. 
-     (c)  Letter  of  Honorable  Dismissal  from  a  Monastery. 

54.  Abbot  Heriman:  The  Copying  of  Books  at  a  Monastery. 

55.  Othlonus:  Work  of  a  Monk  in  writing  and  copying  Books. 

56.  A  Monk:  Work  of  a  Nun  in  copying  Books. 

57.  Symonds:  Scarcity  and  Cost  of  Books. 

58.  Clark-  Anathemas  to  protect  Books  from  Theft. 

59.  Bede:  On  Education  in  Early  England. 

(a)  The  Learning  of  Theodore. 

(b)  Theodore's  Work  for  the  English  Churches. 

(c)  How  Albinus  succeeded  Abbot  Hadrian. 

60.  Alcuin:  Description  of  the  School  at  York. 

61.  Alcuin:  Catalogue  of  the  Cathedral  Library  at  York. 

62.  Alcuin:  Specimens  of  the  Palace  School  Instruction. 

63.  Charlemagne:  Letter  sending  out  a  Collection  of  Sermons. 

64.  Charlemagne:  General  Proclamations  as  to  Education. 

(a)  The  Proclamation  of  787  a.d. 

(b)  General  Admonition  of  789  A.D. 

(c)  Order  as  to  Learning  of  802  a.d. 

65.  Alcuin:  Letter  to  Charlemagne  as  to  Books  and  Learning. 

66.  King  Alfred:  State  of  Learning  in  England  in  his  Time. 

67.  Asser:  Alfred  obtains  Scholars  from  Abroad. 

68.  Asser:  Education  of  the  Son  of  King  Alfred. 

69.  Ninth-Century  Plan  of  the  Monastery  at  Saint  Gall. 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

*  Adams,  G.  B.     Civilization  during  the  Middle  Ages. 

*  Clark,  J.  W.     Libraries  in  the  Mediceval  and  Renaissance  Period, 

*  Cutts,  Edw.  L.    Scenes  and  Characters  of  the  Middle  Ages. 

*  Eckenstein,  Lina.     Women  under  Monasticism. 
Leach,  A.  F.     The  Schools  of  Medicsval  England. 
Monro,  D.  C.  and  Sellery,  G.  E.     Mediceval  Civilization. 
Montalembert,  Count  de.     The  Monks  of  the  West. 
Taylor,  H.  O.     Classical  Heritage  of  the  Middle  Ages. 
Thorndike,  Lynn.     History  of  Mediceval  Europe. 

West,  A.  F.    Alcuin,  and  the  Rise  of  Christian  Schools, 

*  Wishart,  A.  W.    Short  History  of  Monks  and  Monasticism. 


CHAPTER  VII 

EDUCATION  DURING  THE  EARLY  MIDDLE  AGES 

II.  SCHOOLS  ESTABLISHED  AND  INSTRUCTION  PROVIDED 

I.  Elementary  instruction  and  schools 

Monastic  and  conventual  schools.  In  the  preceding  chapters 
we  found  that,  by  the  tenth  century,  the  monasteries  had  devel- 
oped both  inner  monastic  schools  for  those  intending  to  take  the 
vows  {ohlati),  and  outer  monastic  schools  for  those  not  so  intend- 
ing (externi).  The  distinction  in  name  was  due  to  the  fact  that 
the  oblati  were  from  the  first  considered  as  belonging  to  the 
brotherhood,  participating  in  the  religious  services  and  helping 
the  monks  at  their  work.  The  others  were  not  so  admitted,  and 
in  all  monasteries  of  any  size  a  separate  building,  outside  the  main 
portion  of  the  monastery  was  provided  for  the  outer   school. 


Fig.  1 8.  An  Outer  Monastic  School 
(After  an  old  wood  engraving)  i 

A  similar  classification  of  instruction  had  been  evolved  for  the 
convents. 

The  instruction  in  the  inner  school  was  meager,  and  in  the 
outer  school  probably  even  more  so.  Reading,  writing,  music, 
simple  reckoning,  religious  observances,  and  rules  of  conduct 
constituted  the  range  of  instruction.  Reading  was  taught  by 
the  alphabet  method,  as  among  the  Romans,  and  writing  by  the 


84  A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

use  of  wax  tablets  and  the  stylus.  Much  attention  was  given 
to  Latin  pronunciation,  as  had  been  the  practice  at  Rome.  As 
Latin  by  this  time  had  practically  ceased  to  be  a  living  tongue, 
outside  the  Church  and  perhaps  in  Central  Italy,  the  difficul- 
ties of  instruction  were  largely  increased.  The  Psalter,  or  book 
of  Latin  psalms,  was  the  first  reading  book,  and  this  was  memo- 
rized rather  than  read.  Copy-books,  usually  wax,  with  copies 
expressing  some  scriptural  injunction,  were  used.  Music,  being 
of  so  much  importance  in  the  church  services,  received  much 
time  and  attention.  In  arithmetic,  counting  and  finger  reck- 
oning, after  the  Roman  plan,  were  taught.  Latin  was  used  in 
conversation  as  much  as  possible,  some  of  the  old  lesson  books 
much  resembling  conversation  books  of  to-day  in  the  modem 
languages  (R.  75).  Special  attention  seems  to  have  been  given 
to  teaching  rules  of  conduct  to  the  oblati,  and  much  corporal 
punishment  was  used  to  facilitate  learning.  Up  to  the  eleventh 
century  this  instruction,  meager  as  it  was,  constituted  the  whole 
of  the  preparatory  training  necessary  for  the  study  of  theology 
and  a  career  in  the  Church.  In  the  convents  similar  schools  were 
developed,  though,  as  stated  in  the  last  chapter,  much  more  atten- 
tion was  given  to  the  education  of  those  not  intending  to  take  the 
vows. 

Song  and  parish  schools.  In  the  cathedral  churches,  and  other 
larger  non-cathedral  churches,  the  musical  part  of  the  service 
was  very  important,  and  to  secure  boys  for  the  choir  and  for  other 
church  services  these  churches  organized  what  came  to  be  known 
as  song  schools  (R.  70) .  In  these  a  number  of  promising  boys  were 
trained  in  the  same  studies  and  in  much  the  same  way  as  were 
boys  in  the  monastery  schools,  except  that  much  more  attention 
was  given  to  the  musical  instruction.  The  students  in  these 
schools  were  placed  under  the  precentor  (choir  director)  of  the 
cathedral,  or  other  large  church,  the  scholasticus  confining  his 
attention  to  the  higher  or  more  literary  instruction  provided. 
The  boys  usually  were  given  board,  lodging,  and  instruction  in 
return  for  their  services  as  choristers.  As  the  parish  churches  in 
the  diocese  also  came  to  need  boys  for  their  services,  parish 
schools  of  a  similar  nature  were  in  time  organized  in  connection 
with  them.  It  was  out  of  this  need,  and  by  a  very  slow  and 
gradual  evolution,  that  the  parish  school  in  western  Europe  was 
developed  later  on. 

Chantry  schools.     Still  another  type   of  elementary  school. 


SCHOOLS  AND  INSTRUCTION  PROVIDED       85 

which  did  not  arise  until  near  the  latter  part  of  the  period  under 
consideration  in  this  chapter,  but  which  will  be  enumerated  here 
as  descriptive  of  a  type  which  later  became  very  common,  came 
through  wills,  and  the  schools  came  to  be  known  as  chantry  schools, 
or  stipendary  schools.  Men,  in  dying,  who  felt  themselves  particu- 
larly in  need  of  assistance  for  their  misdeeds  on  earth,  would 
leave  a  sum  of  money  to  a  church  to  endow  a  priest,  or  sometimes 
two,  who  were  to  chant  masses  each  day  for  the  repose  of  their 
souls.  Sometimes  the  property  was  left  to  endow  a  priest  to  say 
mass  in  honor  of  some  special  saint,  and  frequently  of  the  Virgin 
Mary.  As  such  priests  usually  felt  the  need  for  some  other  occu- 
pation, some  of  them  began  voluntarily  to  teach  the  elements  of 
religion  and  learning  to  selected  boys,  and  in  time  it  became  com- 
mon for  those  leaving  money  for  the  prayers  to  stipulate  in  the 
will  that  the  priest  should  also  teach  a  school.  Usually  a  very 
elementary  type  of  school  was  provided,  where  the  children  were 
taught  to  know  the  Lord's  Prayer,  the  Creed,  the  Salutation  to 
the  Virgin,  certain  psalms,  to  sign  themselves  rightly  with  the 
sign  of  the  cross,  and  perhaps  to  read  and  write  (Latin).  Some- 
times, on  the  contrary,  and  especially  was  this  the  case  later  on 
in  England,  a  grammar  school  was  ordered  maintained.  After 
the  twelfth  century  this  type  of  foundation  (R.  73)  became  quite 
common. 

y 

•         2.  A dvanced  instruction 

Cathedral  and  higher  monastic  schools.  As  the  song  schools 
developed  the  cathedral  schools  were  of  course  freed  from  the 
necessity  of  teaching  reading  and  writing,  and  could  then  develop 
more  advanced  instruction.  This  they  did,  as  did  many  of  the 
monasteries,  and  to  these  advanced  schools  those  who  felt  the 
need  for  more  training  went.  As  grammar  was,  throughout  all 
the  early  part  of  the  Middle  Ages,  the  first  and  most  important 
subject  of  instruction,  the  advanced  schools  came  to  be  known 
as  grammar  schools,  as  well  as  cathedral  or  episcopal  schools 
(R.  72).  The  cathedral  churches  and  monasteries  of  England  and 
France  early  became  celebrated  for  the  high  character  of  their 
instruction  (R.  71)  and  the  type  of  scholars  they  produced.  All 
these  schools,  though,  suffered  a  serious  set-back  during  the  period 
of  the  Danish  and  Norman  invasions,  many  being  totally  destroyed. 

These  two  types  of  advanced  schools  —  the  cathedral  or  epis- 
copal and  the  monastic  —  formed  what  might  be  called  the  secon- 


86         A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

dary-school  system  of  the  early  Middle  Ages  (Rs.  70,  71).  They 
were  for  at  least  six  hundred  years  the  only  advanced  teaching 
institutions  in  western  Europe,  and  out  of  one  or  the  other  of 
these  two  types  of  advanced  schools  came  practically  all  those 
who  attained  to  leadership  in  the  service  of  the  Church  in  either 
of  its  two  great  branches.  Still  more,  out  of  the  impetus  given  to 
advanced  study  by  the  more  important  of  these  schools,  the  uni- 
versities of  a  later  period  developed;  and  numerous  private  gifts 
of  lands  and  money  were  made  to  establish  grammar  schools  to 
supplement  the  work  done  by  the  cathedral  and  other  large 
church  schools. 

The  Seven  Liberal  Arts.  The  advanced  studies  which  were 
offered  in  the  more  important  monastery  and  cathedral  schools 
comprised  what  came  to  be  known  as  The  Seven  Liberal  Arts  of 
the  Middle  Ages.  The  knowledge  contained  in  these  studies, 
taught  as  the  advanced  instruction  of  the  period,  represents  the 
amount  of  secular  learning  which  was  intentionally  preserved  by 
the  Church  from  neglect  and  destruction  during  the  period  of  the 
barbarian  deluges  and  the  reconstruction  of  society. 

These  Seven  Liberal  Arts  were  comprised  of  two  divisions, 
known  as: 

I.  The  Trivium:  (i)  Grammar;  (2)  Rhetoric;  (3)  Dialectic  (Logic). 
11.  The  Quadrivium:    (4)  Arithmetic;   (5)  Geometry;   (6)   Astron- 
omy; (7)  Music. 

Beyond  these  came  Ethics  or  Metaphysics,  and  the  greatest  of 
all  studies,  Theology.  This  last  represented  the  one  professional 
study  of  the  whole  middle-age  period,  and  was  the  goal  toward 
which  all  the  preceding  studies  had  tended. 

Not  all  these  studies  were  taught  in  every  monastery  or  cathe- 
dral school.  Many  of  the  lesser  monasteries  and  schools  offered 
instruction  chiefly  in  grammar,  and  only  a  little  of  the  studies 
beyond.  Others  emphasized  the  Trivium,  and  taught  perhaps 
only  a  little  of  the  second  group.  Only  a  few  taught  the  full  range 
of  mediaeval  learning,  and  these  were  regarded  as  the  great  schools 
of  the  times  (R.  71). 

Rhabanus  Maurus  (776-865),  one  of  the  greatest  minds  of  the 
Middle  Ages,  Abbot  for  years  at  Fulda,  and  a  mediaeval  textbook 
writer  of  importance,  has  left  us  a  good  description  of  each  of  the 
Seven  Liberal  Arts  studies  as  they  were  developed  in  his  day,  and 
their  use  in  the  Christian  scheme  of  education  (R.  74). 


Plate  i  .  Saint  Thomas  Aquinas  in  the  Schoul  ok 

Albertus  Magnus 

(After  the  painting  by  H.  Lerolle) 


SCHOOLS  AND  INSTRUCTION  PROVIDED       87 

X  3.  Training  of  the  nobility 
Tenth-century  conditions.  Following  the  death  of  Charle- 
magne and  the  break-up  of  the  empire  held  together  by  him,  a 
period  of  organized  anarchy  followed  in  western  Europe.  Author- 
ity broke  down  more  completely  than  before,  and  Europe,  for 
protection,  was  forced  to  organize  itself  into  a  great  number  of 
small  defensive  groups.  Serfs,  freemen  lacking  land,  and  small 
landowners  alike  came  to  depend  on  some  nobleman  for  protec- 
tion, and  this  nobleman  in  turn  upon  some  lord  or  overlord.  For 
this  protection  military  service  was  rendered  in  return.  The 
lord  lived  in  his  castle,  and  the  peasantry  worked  his  land  and 
supported  him,  fighting  his  battles  if  the  need  arose.  This  condi- 
tion of  society  was  known  as  feudalism,  and  the  feudal  relations 
of  lord  and  vassal  came  to  be  the  prevailing  governmental  organi- 
zation of  the  period.  Feudalism  was  at  best  an  organized  an- 
archy, suited  to  rude  and  barbarous  times,  but  so  well  was  it 
adapted  to  existing  conditions  that  it  became  the  prevailing  form 
of  government,  and  continued  as  such  until  a  better  order  of 
society  could  be  evolved.  With  the  invention  of  gunpowder,  the 
rise  of  cities  and  industries,  the  evolution  of  modem  States  by  the 
consolidation  of  numbers  of  these  feudal  governments,  and  the 
establishment  of  order  and  civilization,  feudalism  passed  out  with 

>r  the  passing  of  the  conditions  which  gave  rise  to  it.     From  the 
(?L  end  of  the  ninth  to  the  middle  of  the  thirteenth  centuries  it  was 

^the  dominant  form  of  government.  J 

The  Ufe  of  the  nobility  under  the  feudal  regime  gave  a  certain 
picturesqueness  to  what  was  otherwise  an  age  of  lawlessness  and 
disorder.  The  chief  occupation  of  a  noble  was  fighting,  either  in 
his  own  quarrel  or  that  of  his  overlord.  It  is  hard  for  us  to-day 
to  realize  how  much  fighting  went  on  then.  Much  was  said  about 
"honor,"  but  quarrels  were  easily  started,  and  oaths  were  poorly 
kept,  ut  was  a  day  of  personal  feuds  and  private  warfar^,  and 
every  noble  thought  it  his  right  to  wage  war  on  his  neighbor  at 
any  time,  without  asking  the  consent  of  any  one.  As  a  prepara- 
tion for  actual  warfare  a  series  of  mimic  encounters,  known  as 

^Ktournaments^^  were  held,  in  which  it  often  happened  that  knights 
were  killed.  In  these  encounters  mounted  knights  charged  one 
another  with  spear  and  lance,  performing  feats  similar  to  those 
of  actual  warfare.  This  was  the  great  amusement  of  the  period, 
compared  with  which  the  German  duel,  the  Mexican  bullfight, 


88         A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

or  the  American  game  of  football  are  mild  sports.  The  other 
diversions  of  the  knights  and  nobles  were  hunting,  hawking, 
feasting,  drinking,  making  love,  minstrelsy,  and  chess.  Intel- 
lectual ability  formed  no  part  of  their  accomplishments,  and  a 
knowledge  of  reading  and  writing  was  commonly  regarded  as 
effeminate. 

To  take  this  carousing,  fighting,  pillaging,  ravaging,  destruc- 
tive, and  murderous  instinct,  so  strong  by  nature  among  the 
Germanic  tribes,  and  refine  it  and  in  time  use  it  to  some  better 
purpose,  and  in  so  doing  to  increasingly  civilize  these  Germanic 
lords  and  overlords,  was  the  problem  which  faced  the  Church  and 
all  interested  in  establishing  an  orderly  society  in  Europe.  As 
a  means  of  checking  this  outlawry  the  Church  established  and 
tried  to  enforce  the  "Truce  of  God"  (R.  79),  and  as  a  partial 
means  of  educating  the  nobility  to  some  better  conception  of  a 
purpose  in  life  the  Church  aided  in  the  development  of  the  educa- 
tion of  chivalry,  the  first  secular  form  of  education  in  western 
Europe  since  the  days  of  Rome,  and  added  its  sanction  to  it  after 
it  arose. 

The  education  of  chivalry.  This  form  of  education  was  an 
evolution.  1  It  began  during  the  latter  part  of  the  ninth  century 
and  the  early  part  of  the  tenth,  reached  its  maximum  greatness 
during  the  period  of  the  Crusades  (twelfth  century),  and  passed 
out  of  existence  by  the  sixteenth.^  The  period  of  the  Crusades 
was  the  heroic  age  of  chivalry.  The  system  of  education  which 
gradually  developed  for  \^e  children  of  the  nobility  ]may  be 
briefly  described  as  follows: 

I.  Page.  Up  to  the  age  of  seven  or  eight  the  youth  was  trained 
at  home,  by  his  mother.  He  played  to  develop  strength,  was 
taught  the  meaning  of  obedience,  trained  in  politeness  and  cour- 
tesy, and  his  religious  education  was  begun.  After  this,  usually 
at  seven,  he  was  sent  to  the  court  of  some  other  noble,  usually  his 
father's  superior  in  the  feudal  scale,  though  in  case  of  kings  and 
feudal  lords  of  large  importance  the  children  remained  at  home 
and  were  trained  in  the  palace  school.  From  seven  to  fourteen 
the  boy  was  known  as  a  page.  ^He  was  in  particular  attached  to 
some  lady)  who  supervised  his  education  in  rehgion,  music,  cour- 
tesy, gallantry,  the  etiquette  of  love  and  honor,  and  taught  him 
to  play  chess  and  other  games.  He  was  usually  taught  to  read 
and  write  the  vernacular  language,  and  was  sometimes  given  a 
little  instruction  in  reading  Latin.    To  the  lord  he  rendered  much 


rv7V.^/»    WA/«-^L^U-V  (iA-.vv4-*-<»0U 
SCHOOLS  AND  INSTRUCTION  PROVIDED       89 

personal  service  such  as  messenger,  servant  at  meals,  and  atten- 
tion to  guests.  By  the  men  he  was  trained  in  running,  boxing, 
wrestling,  riding,  swimming,  and  the  use  of  light  weapons. 

2.  Squire.  At  fourteen  or  fifteen  he  became  a  squire.  While 
continuing  to  serve  his  lady,  with  whom  he  was  still  in  company, 
and  continuing  to  render  personal  service  in  the  castle,  the  squire 
became  in  particular  the  personal  servant  and  bodyguard  of  the 
lord  or  knight.  He  was  in  a  sense  a  valet  for  him,  making  his  bed, 
caring  for  his  clothes,  helping 
him  to  dress,  and  looking 
after  him  at  night  and  when 
sick.  He  also  groomed  his 
horse,  looked  after  his  weap- 
ons, and  attended  and  pro- 
tected him  on  the  field  of 
combat  or  in  battle.  He  him- 
self learned  to  hunt,  to  handle 
shield  and  spear,  to  ride  in 
armor,  to  meet  his  opponent, 
and  to  fight  with  sword  and 
battle-axe.  As  he  approached 
the  age  of  twenty-one,  he 
chose  his  lady-love,  who  was 
older  than  he  and  who  might 
be  married,  to  whom  he  swore 
ever  to  be  devoted,  even 
though  he  married  some  one 
else. )  He  also  learned  to 
rhyroe,  to  make  songs,  sing, 

dance,  play  the  harp,  and  observe  the  ceremonials  of  the  Church. 
Girls  were  given  this  instruction  along  with  the  boys,  but  natur- 
ally their  training  placed  its  emphasis  upon  household  duties, 
service,  good  manners,  conversational  abihty,  music,  and  religion. 

3.  Knight.  At  twenty-one  the  boy  was  knighted,  and  of  this 
the  Church  made  an  impressive  ceremonial.  After  fasting,  con- 
fession, a  night  of  vigil  in  armor  spent  at  the  altar  in  holy  medita- 
tion, and  communion  in  the  morning,  the  ceremony  of  dubbing 
the  squire  a  knight  took  place  in  the  presence  of  the  court.  He 
gave  his  sword  to  the  priest,  who  blest  it  upon  the  altar.  He  then 
took  the  oath  "to  defend  the  Church,  to  attack  the  wicked,  to 
respect  the  priesthood,  to  protect  women  and  the  poor,  to  pre- 


p^ 

,^^^-^=^=^^}=^ 

r^ 

w^wif 

1: 

^m%^^m 

i 

III 

1 

Fig.  19.  a  Squire  being  knighted 
(From  an  old  manuscript) 


90 


A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


serve  the  country  in  tranquillity,  and  to  shed  his  blood,  even  to 
its  last  drop,  in  behalf  of  his  brethren."  The  priest  then  returned 
him  the  sword  which  he  had  blessed,  charging  him  "to  protect 
the  widows  and  orphans,  to  restore  and  preserve  the  desolate,  to 
revenge  the  wronged,  and  to  confirm  the  virtuous."  He  then 
knelt  before  his  lord,  who,  drawing  his  own  sword  and  holding  it 
over  him,  said:  "In  the  name  of  God,  of  our  Lady,  of  thy  patron 
Saint,  and  of  Saint  Michael  and  Saint  George,  I  dub  thee  knight; 
be  brave  (touching  him  with  the  sword  on  one  shoulder),  be  bold 
(on  the  other  shoulder),  and  loyal  (on  the  head)." 

The  chivalric  ideals.  Such,  briefly  stated,  was  the  education 
of  chivalry.  The  cathedral  and  monastery  schools  not  meeting 
the  needs  of  the  nobility,  the  castle  school  was 
evolved.  There  was  little  that  was  intellectual 
about  the  training  given  —  few  books,  and  no 
training  in  Latin.  Instead,  the  native  language 
was  emphasized,  and  squires  in  England  fre- 
quently learned  to  speak  French.  It  was  essen- 
tially an  education  for  secular  ends,  and  pre- 
pared not  only  for  active  participation  in  the 
feuds  and  warfare  of  the  time,  but  also  for  the 
Seven  Perfections  of  the  Middle  Ages:  (i)  Rid- 
ing, (2)  Swimming,  (3)  Archery,  (4)  Fencing, 
(5)  Hunting,  (6)  Whist  or  Chess,  and  (7)  Rhym- 
ing.) It  also  represents  the  first  type  of  school- 
ing in  the  Middle  Ages  designed  to  prepare  for 
life  here,  rather  than  hereafter.  For  the  no- 
bility it  was  a  discipline,  just  as  the  Seven  Lib- 
eral Arts  was  a  discipline  for  the  monks  and 
clergy.  Out  of  it  later  on  was  evolved  the  edu- 
cation of  a  gentleman  as  distinct  from  that  of 
a  scholar. 

That  such  training  had  a  civilizing  effect  on 
the  nobility  of  the  time  cannot  be  doubted. 
\Through  it  the  Church  exercised  a  restraining 
and  civilizing  influence  on  a  rude,  quarrelsome,  and  impetuous 
people,  who  resented  restraints  and  who  had  no  use  for  intel- 
lectual discipline. )  It  developed  the  ability  to  work  together  for 
common  ends,  personal  loyalty,  and  a  sense  of  honor  in  an  age 
when  these  were  much-needed  traits,  and  the  ideal  of  a  life  of 
regulated  service  in  place  of  one  of  lawless  gratification  was  set 


Fig.  20. 
A  Knight  of  the 
Time  of  the  First 

Crusade 

(From  a  manuscript 

in  the  British 

Museum) 


SCHOOLS  AND  INSTRUCTION  PROVIDED      91 

up.i  What  monasticism  had  done  for  the  religious  life  in  digni- 
fying labor  and  service,  chivalry  did  for  secular  life,  j  The  Ten 
Commandments  of  chivalrj',  (i)  to  pray,  (2)  to  avoia  sin,  (3)  to 
defend  the  Church,  (4)  to  protect  widows  and  orphans,  (5)  to 
travel,  (6)  to  wage  loyal  war,  (7)  to  fight  for  his  Lady,  (8)  to  de- 
fend the  right,  (9)  to  love  his  God,  and  (10)  to  listen  to  good  and 
true  men,  while  not  often  followed,  were  valuable  precepts  to 
uphold  in  that  age  and  time.  In  the  great  Crusades  movement 
of  the  twelfth  century  the  Church  consecrated  the  military 
prowess  and  restless  energy  of  the  nobility  to  her  service,  but 
after  this  wave  had  passed  chivalry  became  formal  and  stilted 
and  rapidly  declined  in  importance  (R.  80). 

'M  ^     4.  Characteristics  of  mediceval  education 

Foundations  laid  for  a  new  order.  The  education  which  we 
have  just  described  covers  the  period  from  the  time  of  the  down- 
fall of  Rome  to  the  twelfth  or  the  thirteenth  centuryJ  It  repre- 
sents what  the  Church  evolved  to  replace  that  which  it  and  the 
barbarians  had  destroyed.  Meager  as  it  still  was,  after  seven  or 
eight  centuries  of  effort,  it  nevertheless  presents  certain  clearly 
marked  lines  of  development.  The  beginnings  of  a  new  Christian 
civilization  among  the  tribes  which  had  invaded  and  overrun  the 
old  Roman  Empire  are  evident,  and,  toward  the  latter  part  of  the 
Middle  Ages,  we  note  the  development  of  a  number  of  centers  of 
learning  (R.  71)  and  the  beginnings  of  that  specialization  of  knowl-v 
edge  (church  doctrine,  classical  learning,  music,  logic  and  ethics, , 
theology),  at  different  church  and  monastery  schools,  which  prom- 
ised much  for  the  future  of  learning.  -  We  also  notice,  and  will 
see  the  same  evidence  in  the  following  chapter,  the  beginnings 
of  a  class  of  scholarly  men,  though  the  scholarship  is  very  limited 
in  scope  and  along  lines  thoroughly  approved  by  the  Churchy 

In  education  proper,  in  the  sense  that  we  understand  it,  the 
schools  provided  were  still  for  a  very  limited  class,  and  secondary 
rather  than  elementary  in  nature.  They  were  intended  to  meet 
the  needs  of  an  institution  rather  than  of  a  people  Jand  to  prepare 
those  who  studied  in  them  for  service  to  that  institution.  That 
institution,  too,  had  concentrated  its  efforts  on  preparing  its  mem- 
bers for  life  in  another  world,  and  not  for  life  or  service  in  this. 
/  There  were  as  yet  no  independent  schools  or  scholars,  the  monks 
and  clergy  represented  the  one  learned  class.) Theology  was  the 
one  professional  study,  the  ability  to  read  and  write  was  not 


92         A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

regarded  by  noble  or  commoner  as  of  any  particular  importance, 
and  all  book  knowledge  was  in  a  language  which  the  people  did 
not  understand  when  they  heard  it  and  could  not  read.  Society 
was  as  yet  composed  of  three  classes  — (feudal  warriors,  who 
spent  their  time  in  amusements  or  fighting,  and  who  had  evolved 
a  form  of  knightly  training  for  their  children);  brivileged  priests 
and  monks  and  nuns,  who  controlled  all  bookleaming  and  oppor- 
tunities for  professional  advancement]^  and  the  great  mass  of 
working  peasants,  engaged  chiefly  in  agriculture,  and  belonging 
to  their  protecting  lord. 

(For  these  peasants  there  was  as  yet  no  education  aside  from 
■vmat  the  Church  gave  through  her  watchful  oversight  and  her 
religious  services  (R.  8i),  and  but  little  leisure,  freedom,  wealth, 
security,  or  economic  need  to  make  such  education  possible  or 
desirable. )  Moreover,  the  other-worldly  attitude  of  the  Church 
made  suoi  education  seem  unnecessary.  [  It  was  still  the  educa- 
tion of  a  few  for  institutional  purposes,  though  here  and  there, 
by  the  close  of  the  twelfth  century,  the  Church  was  beginning  to 
urge  its  members  to  provide  some  education  for  their  children 
(R.  82),  and  the  world,  was  at  last  getting  ready  for  the  evolution 
of  the  independent  scholar)  and  soon  would  be  ready  for  the 
evolution  oT  schools  to  meet  secular  needs. ) 

Repressive  attitude  of  the  mediaeval  Church.  The  great  work 
of  the  Church  during  this  period,  as  we  see  it  to-day,  was  to  assim- 
ilate and  sufficiently  civilize  the  barbarians  to  make  possible  a 
new  civiliz^jipn,  based  on  knowledge  and  reason  rather  than  force^ 
To  this  end  the  Church  had  interposed  her  authority  against  bar- 
barian force,  and  had  slowly  won  the  contest. )  Almost  of  neces- 
sity the  Church  had  been  compelled  to  insist  "upon  her  way,  and 
this  type  of  absolutism  in  church  government  had  been  extended 
to  most  other  matters. )  The  Bible,  or  rather  the  interpretations 
of  it  which  church  councils,  popes,  bishops,  and  theological  writ- 
ers had  made,  became  authoritative,  and  disobedience  or  doubt 
became  sinful  in  the  eyes  of  the  Church.)  The  Scriptures  were 
made  the  authority  for  everything,  and  interpretations  the  most 
fantastic  were  made  of  scriptural  verses.^i  Unquestioning  belief 
was  extended  to  many  other  matters,  with  the  result  that  tales 
the  most  wonderful  were  recounted  and  believed.  To  question, 
to  doubt,  to  disbeheve  —  these  were  among  the  deadly  sins  of 
the  early  Middle  Ages.)  This  attitude  of  mind  undoubtedly  had 
its  value  in  assimilating  and  civilizing  the  barbarians,  and  prob- 


SCHOOLS  AND  INSTRUCTION  PROVIDED      93 

ably  was  a  necessity  at  the  time,  but  it  was  bad  for  the  future  of 
the  Church  as  an  institutionj  and  utterly  opposed  to  scientific 
inquiry  and  intellectual  progress. 

This  authoritative  and  repressive  attitude  of  the  Church  ex- 
pressed itself  in  many  ways.  The  teaching  of  the  period  is  an 
excellent  example  of  this  influence.  (The  instruction  in  the  so- 
called  Seven  Liberal  Arts  remained  imchanged  throughout  a 
period  of  half  a  dozen  centuries  / —  so  much  accumulated  knowl- 
edge passed  on  as  a  legacy  to  succeeding  generations.;  It  repre- 
sented mere  instruction*^  not  education^  Not  until  the  world 
could  shake  off  this  mediaeval  attitude  toward  scientific  inquiry 
and  make  possible  honest  doubt  was  any  real  intellectual  progress 
possible. 

The  first  teacher*s  certificates  and  school  supervision.  Toward 
the  latter  part  of  the  period  under  consideration  in  this  chapter 
an  interesting  development  in  church  school  administration  took 
place.  As  the  cathedral  and  song  schools  increased  assistant 
teachers  were  needed,  and  the  scholasticus  and  precentor  gradually 
withdrew  from  instruction  and  became  the  supervisors  of  instruc- 
tion, or  rather  the  principals  of  their  respective  schools.',  As  song 
or  parish  schools  were  established  in  the  parishes  of  the  diocese 
teachers  for  these  were  needed,  and  the  scholasticus  and  precentor 
extended  their  authority  and  supervision  over  these,  just  as  the 
Bishop  had  done  much  earlier  (p.  53)  over  the  training  and 
appointment  of  priests./  By  11 50  we  have,  clearly  evolved,  the 
system  of  central  supervision  of  the  training  of  all  teachers  in  the 
diocese  througlTtlie  issuing,  for  the  first  time  in  Europ>e,  of  licenses 
tojeach  (R.  83).  The  system  was  finally  put  into  legal  form  by 
a  decree  adopted  by  a  general  council  of  the  Church  at  Rome,  in 
1^179,  which  required  that  the  scholasticus  "should  have  authority 
to  superintend  all  the  schoolmasters  of  the  diocese  and  grant  them 
licenses  without  which  none  should  presume  to  teachy  and  that 
"  nothing  be  exacted  for  licenses  to  teach ' '  issued  by  him,  thus  stop- 
ping the  charging  of  fees  for  their  issuance.  The  precentor,  in  a  sim- 
ilar manner,  claimed  and  often  secured  supervision  of  all  elemen- 
tary, and  especially  all  song-school  instruction. )  Teachers  were 
also  required  to  take  an  oath  of  fealty  and  obedience  (R.  84  b). 
As  a  result  of  centuries  of  evolution  we  thus  find,  by  \  1200^  a 
limited  but  powerful  church  school  system,  with  centralized  con- 
trol and  supervision  of  instruction,  diocesan  licenses  to  teach,  and 
a  curriculum  adapted  to  theneeds  of  the  institution  in  control  of 


94  A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

the  schools.  We  also  note  the  beginnings  of  secular  instruction 
in  the  training  of  the  nobility  for  life's  service,  though  even  this 
is  approved  and  sanctioned  by  the  Church.  The  centralized 
religious  control  thus  established  continued  until  the  nineteenth 
century,  andstill  exists  to  a  more  or  less  important  degree  in  the 
school  systems  of  Italy,  the  old  Austro-Hungarian  States,  Ger- 
many, England,  an3^some  other  western  nations.)  As  we  shall 
see^ater  on,  one  of  the  big  battles  in  the  process  of  developing 
state  school  systems  has  come  through  the  attempt  of  the  State 
to  substitute  its  own  organization  for  this  religious  monopoly  of 
instruction.  >  "^ 

QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

1.  Outline  the  instruction  in  an  inner  monastery  school. 

2.  Show  how  the  mediaeval  parish  school  naturally  developed  as  an  offshoot 
of  the  cathedral  schools,  and  was  supplemented  later  by  the  endowed 
chantry  schools. 

3.  What  effect  did  the  development  of  song-school  instruction  have  on 
the  instruction  in  the  cathedral  schools? 

-  4.  Why  was  it  difficult  to  develop  good  cathedral  schools  during  the  early 
Middle  Ages? 

5.  What  does  the  fact  that  the  few  great  textbooks  were  in  use  for  so 
many  centuries  indicate  as  to  the  character  of  educational  progress 
during  the  Middle  Ages? 

6.  Was  the  Church  wise  in  adopting  and  sanctifying  the  education  of 
chivalry?    Why? 

7.  What  important  contributions  to  world  progress  came  out  of  chivalric 
-^      education? 

8.  What  ideals  and  practices  from  chivalry  have  been  retained  and  are 
still  in  use  to-day?  Does  the  Boy  Scouts  movement  embody  any  of  the 
chivalric  ideas  and  training? 

9.  Compare  the  education  of  the  body  by  the  Greeks  and  under  chivalry. 

10.  Compare  the  Athenian  ephebic  oath  with  the  vows  of  chivalry. 

11.  Picture  the  present  world  transferred  back  to  a  time  when  theology  was 
the  one  profession. 

12.  What  educational  theory,  conscious  or  unconscious,  formed  the  basis 
for  mediaeval  education  and  instruction? 

13.  Explain  why  the  Church,  after  six  or  seven  centuries  of  effort,  still  pro- 
vided schools  only  for  preparation  for  its  own  service. 

14.  What  does  the  lack  of  independent  scholars  during  the  Middle  Ages  indi- 
cate as  to  possible  leisure? 

15.  Contrast  the  purposes  of  mediaeval  education  and  the  education  of  to-day. 

16.  When  Greece  and  Rome  offered  no  precedents,  how  did  the  Church  come 
to  so  fully  develop  and  control  the  education  which  was  provided? 

17.  Compare  the  supervisory  work  of  a  modern  county  superintendent  with 
that  of  a  scholastictis  of  a  mediaeval  cathedral. 


SCHOOLS  AND  INSTRUCTION  PROVIDED      95 


SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  selections  are  repro- 
duced: 


y  70. 
I  71- 


Leach:  Song  and  Grammar  Schools  in  England. 
Mullinger:  The  Episcopal  and  Monastic  Schools. 
Statutes:  The  School  at  Salisbury  Cathedral. 
73.  Aldwincle:  Foimdation  Grant  for  a  Chantry  School. 
S:  74.  Maurus:  The  Seven  Liberal  Arts. 
^    v75.  Leach:  A  Mediaeval  Latin  Colloquy. 
^^    i  76.  Quintilian:  On  the  Importance  of  the  Study  of  Grammar. 

■^77.  AngUcus:  The  Elements,  and  the  Planets. 
4J    ^  (a)  Of  the  Elements. 

i5^  *  {h)  Of  Double  Moving  of  the  Planets. 

j^  '*^  78.  Cott :  A  Tenth  Century  Schoolmaster's  Books. 
\    I  79.  Archbishop  of  Cologne:  The  Truce  of  God. 
w    f  80.  Gautier:  How  the  Church  used  Chivalry. 

i8i.  Draper:  Educational  Influences  of  the  Church  Services. 
t)82.  Winchester  Diocesan  Council:. How  the  Church  urged  that  the  Ele- 
ments of  Religious  Education  be  given. 
^3.  Lincoln  Cathedral:  Licenses  required  to  teach  Song. 
^4.  English  Forms:  Appointment  and  Oath  of  a  Grammar-School  Master. 
^  (a)  Northallerton:  Appointment  of  a  master  of  Song  and  Grammar. 

\  (b)  Archdeacon  of  Ely :  Oath  of  a  Grammar-School  Master  to. 

^  SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

J^    ^^belson,  Paul.     The  Seven  Liberal  Arts. 
^      '■  Addison,  Julia  de  W.    Arts  and  Crafts  in  the  Middle  Ages. 
'^'  '*^    Besant,  W.     The  Story  of  King  Alfred. 
*  Clark,  J.  W.     The  Care  of  Books. 
Davidson,  Thomas.     "The  Seven  Liberal  Arts";  in  Educational  Revieiv, 
V     ]|J      vol.  n,  pp.  467-73.     (Also  in  his  Aristotle.) 
4^K.  Mombert,  J.  I.     History  of  Charles  the  Great. 
Y        *  Mullinger,  J.  B.     The  Schools  of  Charles  the  Great. 
4     ^-  Sandys,  J.  E.     History  of  Classical  Scholarship,  vol.  I. 
►i^j^  -  Scheffel,  Victor.     Ekkehard.     (Historical  novel  of  monastic  life.) 
W      v.  Steele,  Philip.     Mediceval  Lore.     (Anglicus'  Cyclopaedia.)  -- 


/>^ 


X 


i4 


^u 


CHAPTER  VIII 

INFLUENCES  TENDING  TOWARD  A  REVIVAL  OF 
LEARNING 

I.  MOSLEM  LEARNING  FROM  SPAIN 

Great  absorptive  power  for  learning.  The  original  Arabians 
themselves  were  not  a  well-educated  people.  Before  the  time  of 
Mohammed  we  have  practically  no  records  as  to  any  education 
among  them.  When  in  their  rehgious  conquests  they  overran 
Syria,  they  came  in  contact  with  the  survivals  of  that  won- 
derful Greek  civilization  and  learning,  and  this  they  absorbed 
with  greatest  avidity. 

Mohammedanism  now  came  in  contact  with  an  educated  peo- 
ple, as  it  did  also  in  Babylonia  (637),  in  Assyria  (640),  and  in 
Egypt  (642),  and  the  need  of  a  better  statement  of  the  somewhat 
crude  faith  now  became  evident.  The  same  process  now  took 
place  as  had  occurred  earlier  with  Christianity.  The  Nestorian 
Christians  and  the  Syrian  monks  became  the  scholars  for  the 
Mohammedans,  and  the  Mohammedan  faith  was  clothed  in  Greek 
forms  and  received  a  thorough  tincturing  of  Greek  philosophic 
thought.  Within  a  century  they  had  translated  from  Syriac  into 
Arabic,  or  from  the  original  Greek,  much  of  the  old  Greek  learning 
in  philosophy,  science,  and  medicine,  and  the  cities  of  Syria,  and 
in  particular  their  capital,  Damascus,  became  renowned  for  their 
learning.  In  760  Bagdad,  on  the  Tigris,  was  founded,  and  super- 
seded Damascus  as  the  capital.  Extending  eastward,  these  people 
were  soon  busy  absorbing  Hindu  mathematical  knowledge, 
obtaining  from  them  (c.  8co)  the  so-called  Arabic  notation  and 
algebra. 

They  develop  schools  and  advance  learning.  In  786  Haroun- 
al-Raschid  became  Caliph  at  Bagdad,  and  he  and  his  son  made 
it  an  intellectual  center  of  first  importance.  In  all  the  known 
world  probably  no  city,  not  even  Constantinople,  during  the 
latter  part  of  the  eighth  century  and  most  of  the  ninth,  could  vie 
with  Bagdad  as  a  center  of  learning^  Basra,  Kufa,  and  other 
eastern  cities  were  also  noted  places.  Schools  were  opened  in 
connection  with  the  mosques  (churches),  a  university  after  the 
old  Greek  model  was  founded,  a  large  library  was  organized,  and 


INFLUENCES  TOWARD  A  REVIVAL 


97 


an  observatory  was  built.  Large  numbers  of  students  thronged 
the  city,  learned  Greeks  and  Jews  taught  in  the  schools,  and  a 
number  of  advances  on  the  scientific  work  done  by  the  Greeks 
were  made. 

This  eastern  learning  was  now  gradually  carried  to  Spain  by 
traveling  Mohammedan  scholars,  and  there  the  energy  of  con- 
quest was  gradually  turned  to  the  development  of  schools  and 
learning.  By  900  a  good  civilization  and  intellectual  life  had 
been  developed  in  Spain,  and  before  1000  the  teaching  in  Spain, 
especially  along  Greek  philosophical  lines,  had  become  sufficiently 
known  to  attract  a  few  adventurous  monks  from  Christian 
Europe.       In   Cordova,  Granada,   Toledo,  and  Seville  strong 


CYPRUS 

EASTERN 

mediterranea:.  . 

SEA 


The  Moslem  West 


The  Moslem  East 


Fig.  21.  Showing  Centers  of  Moslem  Learning 


universities  were  developed,  where  Jews  and  Hellenized  Moham- 
medans taught  the  learning  of  "the  East,  and  made  further  ad- 
vances in  the  sciences  and  mathematics.  Physics,  chemistry, 
astronomy,  mathematics,  physiolog>%  medicine,  and  surgery 
were  the  great  subjects  of  study.  Greek  philosophy  also  was 
taught.  They  developed  schools  and  large  libraries,  taught 
geography  from  globes,  studied  astronomy  in  observatories, 
counted  time  by  pendulum  clocks,  invented  the  compass  and  gun- 
powder, developed  hospitals,  and  taught  medicine  and  surgery 
in  schools  (R.  86). 

Their  cities  were  equally  noteworthy  for  their  magnificent 
palaces,  mosques,  public  baths,  market-places,  aqueducts,  and 
paved  and  Ughted  streets  —  things  unknown  in  Christian  Europe 
for  centuries  to  come  (R.  85).  It  became  fashionable  for  wealthy 
men  to  become  patrons  of  learning,  and  to  collect  large  libraries 


V 


98         A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

and  place  them  at  the  disposal  of  scholars,  thus  revealing  interests 
in  marked  contrast  to  those  of  the  fighting  nobility  of  Christian 
Europe. 

Their  influence  on  western  Europe.  Western  Europe  of  the 
tenth  to  the  twelfth  centuries  presented  a  dreary  contrast,  in 
almost  every  particular,  to  the  brilliant  life  of  southern  Spain. 
Just  emerging  from  barbarism,  it  was  still  in  an  age  of  general 
disorder  and  of  the  simplest  rehgious  faith.  The  age  of  reason 
and  of  scientific  experiment  as  a  means  of  arriving  at  truth  had 
not  yet  dawned,  and  would  not  do  so  for  centuries  to  come. 
Monks  and  clerics,  representing  the  one  learned  class,  regarded 
this  Moslem  science  as  ''black  art,"  and  in  consequence  Europe, 
centuries  later,  had  slowly  to  rediscover  the  scientific  knowledge 
which  might  have  been  had  for  the  taking.  Only  the  book  science 
of  Aristotle  would  the  Church  accept,  and  even  this  only  after 
some  hesitation  (Rs.  89,  90). 

Western  Europe  had,  however,  advanced  far  enough  through 
the  study  of  the  Seven  Liberal  Arts  to  desire  corrected  and  addi- 
tional texts  of  the  earlier  classical  writers,  particularly  Aristotle, 
and  also  to  be  willing  to  accept  some  of  the  mathematical  knowl- 
edge of  these  Saracens.  It  was  here  that  the  Moslem  learning  in 
Spain  helped  in  the  intellectual  awakening  of  the  rest  of  Europe. 
AdeUiard,  an  English  monk,  studied  at  Cordova  about  1 1 20,  and 
took  back  with  him  some  knowledge  of  arithmetic,  algebra,  and 
geometry.  His  Euclid  was  in  general  use  in  the  universities  by 
1300.  Gerard  of  Cremona,  in  Lombardy  (1114-1187),  who 
studied  at  Toledo  a  little  later,  rendered  a  similar  service  for 
Italy.  He  also  translated  many  works  from  the  Arabic,  includ- 
ing Ptolemy's  Almagest,  a  book  of  astronomical  tables,  and  Alha- 
zen's  (Spanish  scholar,  c.  1 100) -book  on  Optics.  Other  monks 
studied  in  the  Spanish  cities  during  the  twelfth  century,  a  few 
of  whom  brought  back  translations  of  importance. 

What  Europe  obtained  through  Moslem  sources  which  it  prized 
most,  though,  was  the  commentary  on  Aristotle  by  Averroes  and 
the  works  of  Aristotle  (R.  88).  The  list  of  the  books  of  Aristotle 
in  use  in  the  mediaeval  imiversities  by  1300  (R.  87)  reveals  the 
great  importance  of  the  additions  made.  By  the  middle  of  the 
twelfth  century  Aristotle's  Ethics,  Metaphysics,  Physics,  and 
Psychology,  as  well  as  some  of  his  minor  works,  had  been  trans- 
lated into  Latin  and  were  beginning  to  be  made  available  for 
study.  Western  Europe  also  was  ready  to  use  the  Arabic  (Hindu) 


INFLtteNCES  TOWARD  A  REVIVAL         99 

system  of  notation,  the  elements  of  algebra,  Euclid's  geometry, 
and  Ptolemy's  work  on  the  motion  of  the  heavens.    These  con- 
tributions western  Europe  was  ready  for;  the   larger  scientific 
knowledge  of  the  Saracens,  their  pharmacopoeias,   dictionaries, 
cyclopaedias,  histories,  and  biographies,  it  was  not  yet  ready  to 
receive. 
X        One  other  influence  crept  in  from  these  peoples  which  was  of 
^     large  future  importance  —  the  music  and  light  literature  and  love 
songs  of  Spain.     There  had  been  developed  in  this  sunny  land  a 
life  of  light  gayety,  chivalrous  gallantry,  elegant  courtesies,  and 
poetic  and  musical  charm,  and  this  gradually  found  its  way  across 
V^the  Pyrenees.     At  first  it  affected  Provence  and  Languedoc,  in 
^    southern  France,  then  Sicily  and  Italy,  and  finally  the  gay  con- 
3    tagion  of  lute  and  mandolin  and  love  songs  spread  throughout  all 
J     western  Europe.    A  race  of  troubadours  and  minnesingers  arose, 
'     singing  in  the  vernacular,  traveling  about  the  country,  and  being 
entertained  in  castle  halls. 

Lordlyng  listneth  to  my  tale 

Which  is  merryr  than  the  nightengale 

V    won  admission  at  any  castle  gate.     "Out  of  these  genial  but  not 
^     orthodox  beginnings  the  polite  literature  of  modem  Europe 
arose." 

II.  THE  RISE  OF  SCHOLASTIC  THEOLOGY 

The  eleventh  century  a  turning-point.     By  the  end  of  the 

eleventh  century  a  distinct  turning-point  had  been  reached  in 
,  ^the  struggle  to  save  civilization  from  perishing.     From  this  time 
''on  it  was  clear  that  the  battle  had  been  won,  and  that  a  new 
'"'Christian  civilization  would  in  time  arise  in  western  Europe. 
S. -Much  still  remained  to  be  done,  and  centuries  of  effort  would  be 
.<^required,  but  the  Church,  almost  for  the  first  time  in  more  than 
,  ^six  hundred  years,  felt  that  it  could  now  pause  to  organize  and 
■  ^  systematize  its  faith.     The  invasions  and  destruction  of  the 
-o.  Northmen  had  at  last  ceased,  the  Mohammedan  conquests  were 
4^  over,  almost  the  last  of  the  Germanic  tribes  in  Europe  had  settled 
down  and  had  accepted  Christianity,  and  the  fighting  nobihty 
of  Europe  were  being  held  somewhat  in  restraint  by  the  might 
of  the  Church,  the  "Truce  of  God"  (R.  79),  and  the  softening 
influence  of  chivalric  education  (R.  80).    There  were  many  evi- 
dences, too,  by  the  end  of  the  eleventh  tentury,  that  the  western 
Christian  world,  after  the  long  intellectual  night,  was  soon  to 


lOO       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

awaken  to  a  new  intellectual  life.  The  twelfth  century,  in  par- 
ticular, was  a  period  when  it  was  evident  that  some  new  leaven 
was  at  work. 

Up  to  about  the  close  of  the  eleventh  century  western  Europe 
had  been  living  in  an  age  of  simple  faith.  The  Christian  world 
everywhere  lay  under  "a  veil  of  faith,  illusion,  and  childish  pre- 
possession." The  mysteries  of  Christianity  and  the  many  incon- 
sistencies of  its  teachings  and  beliefs  were  accepted  with  childlike 
docility,  and  the  Church  had  felt  little  call  to  organize,  to  syste- 
matize, or  to  explain. 

Rise  of  the  spirit  of  inquiry.  As  the  cathedral  schools  grew  in 
importance  as  teaching  institutions,  and  came  to  have  many 
teachers  and  students,  a  few  of  them  became  noted  as  places 
where  good  instruction  was  imparted  and  great  teachers  were  to 
be  found.  Canterbury  in  England,  Paris  and  Chartres  in  France, 
and  several  of  the  cities  in  northern  Italy  early  were  noted  for 
the  qualit}^  of  their  instruction.  The  great  teachers  and  the  keen- 
est students  of  the  time  were  to  be  found  in  the  cathedral  schools 
in  these  places,  and  the  monastic  schools  now  lost  their  earlier 
importance  as  teaching  institutions.  By  the  twelfth  century  they 
had  been  completely  superseded  as  important  teaching  centers 
by  the  rapidly  developing  cathedral  schools.  To  these  more 
important  cathedral  schools  students  now  came  from  long  dis- 
tances to  study  under  some  noted  teacher. 

The  rise  of  scholastic  theology.  The  Church,  in  a  very  intelli- 
gent and  commendable  manner,  prepared  to  meet  and  use  this 
\new  spirit  in  the  organization,  systematization,  and  restatement 
of  its  faith  and  doctrine,  and  the  great  era  of  Scholasticism  now 
arose.  During  the  latter  part  of  the  twelfth  and  in  the  thirteenth 
century  Scholasticism  was  at  its  height;  after  that,  its  work  being 
done,  it  rapidly  declined  as  an  educational  force,  and  the  new 
universities  inherited  the  spirit  which  had  given  rise  to  its  labors. 

With  the  new  emphasis  now  placed  on  reasoning,  Dialectic  or 
Logic  superseded  Grammar  as  the  great  subject  of  study,  and 
logical  analysis  was  now  applied  to  the  problems  of  religion.  The 
Church  adopted  and  guided  the  movement,  and  the  schools  of 
the  time  turned  their  energy  into  directions  approved  by  it. 
Aristotle  also  was  in  time  adopted  by  the  Church,  after  the  trans- 
lation of  his  principal  works  had  been  effected  (Rs.  87,  90),  and 
his  philosophy  was  made  a  bulwark  for  Christian  doctrine  through- 
out the  remainder  of  the  Middle  Ages.     For  the  next  four  centu- 


INFLUENCES  TOWARD  A  REVIVAL        loi 

ries  Aristotle  thoroughly  dominated  all   philosophic   thinking.  ^ 
The  great  development  and  use  of  logical  analysis  now  produced 
many  keen  and  subtle  minds,  who  worked  intensively  a  narrow 
and  limited  field  of  thought.    The  result  was  a  thorough  reorgani- 
zation and  restatement  of  the  theology  of  the  Church. 

Results  of  their  work.     The  work  of  the  Schoolmen  was  to 
organize  and  present  in  systematic  and  dogmatic  form  the  teach- 
ings of  the  Church  (R.  92).    This  they  did  exceedingly  well,  and 
the  result  was  a  thorough  organization  of  Theology  as  a  teaching 
subject. '  They  did  little  to  extend  knowledge,  and  nothing  at  all 
to  apply  it  to  the  problems  of  nature  and  man.    Their  work  was 
abstract  and  philosophical  instead,  dealing  wholly  with  theolog- 
ical questions.  ;  The  purpose  was  to  lay  down  principles,  and  to  J 
offer  a  training  in  analysis,  comparison,  classification,  and  deduc-   ^ 
tion  which  would  prepare  learned  and  subtle  defenders  of  the  faith  ^^^ 
of  the  Church.  \So  successful  were  the  Schoolmen  in  their  efforts 
that  instruction  in  Theology  was  raised  by  their  work  to  a  new 
position  of  importance,  /and  a  new  interest  in  theological  scholar- 
ship and  general  learning  was  awakened  which  helped  not  a  Uttle 
to  deflect  many  strong  sphits  from  a  life  of  warfare  to  a  life  of    -      ^ 
study.     They  made  the  problems  of  learning  seem  much  more  'V    ^ 
worth  while,  and  their  work  helped  to  create  a  more  tolerant 
attitude  toward  the  supporters  of  either  side  of  debatable  ques- 
tions by  revealing  so  clearly  that  there  are  two  sides  to  every     n 
question.     This  new  learning,  new  interest  in  learning,  and  new 
spirit  of  tolerance  the  rising  imiversities  inherited. 

III.  LAW  AND  MEDICINE  AS  NEW  STUDIES 

The  old  Roman  cities.  The  old  Roman  Empire,  it  will  be  re- 
membered, came  to  be  largely  a  collection  of  provincial  cities. 
These  were  the  centers  of  Roman  civilization  and  culture.  After 
the  downfall  of  the  governing  power  of  Rome,  the  great  highways  ,j 

were  no  longer  repaired,  brigandage  became  common,  trade  and  '  ^ 
intercourse  largely  ceased,  and  the  provincial  cities  which  were 
not  destroyed  in  the  barbarian  invasions  declined  in  population 
and  number,  passing  under  the  control  of  their  bishops  who  long  >  q^^ 
ruled  them  as  feudal  lords.  During  the  long  period  of  disorder 
many  of  the  old  Roman  cities  entirely  disappeared  (R.  49).  Only 
in  Italy,  and  particularly  in  northern  Italy,  did  these  old  cities 
retain  anything  of  their  earlier  municipal  life,  or  anything  worth 
mentioning  of  their  former  industry  and  commerce.     But  even 


\.  r<i 


I02        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

here  they  lost  most  of  their  earlier  importance  as  centers  of  cul- 
ture and  trade,  becoming  merely  ecclesiastical  towns.  After  the 
death  of  Charlemagne,  the  break-up  of  his  empire,  and  the  insti- 
tution of  feudal  conditions,  the  cities  and  towns  declined  still  more 
in  importance,  and  few  of  any  size  remained. 

In  Italy  feudalism  never  attained  the  strength  it  did  in  northern 
Europe.  Throughout  all  the  early  Middle  Ages  the  cities  there 
retained  something  of  their  old  privileges,  though  ruled  by  prince- 
bishops  residing  in  them.  They  also  retained  something  of  the 
old  Roman  civilization,  and  Roman  legal  usages  and  some  knowl- 
edge of  Roman  law  never  quite  died  out.  In  other  respects  they 
much  resembled  mediaeval  cities  elsewhere. 

The  Italian  cities  revive  the  study  of  Roman  law.  As  was 
stated  above,  Roman  legal  usages  and  some  knowledge  of  Roman 
law  had  never  quite  died  out  in  these  Italian  cities.  But,  while 
regarded  with  reverence,  the  law  was  not  much  understood,  little 
study  was  given  to  it,  and  important  parts  of  it  were  neglected 
and  forgotten.  The  struggle  with  the  ruling  bishops  in  the  second 
half  of  the  eleventh  century,  and  the  discussions  which  arose  dur- 
ing the  investiture  conflict,  caused  new  attention  to  be  given  to 
legal  questions,  and  both  the  study  of  Roman  (civil)  and  Church 
(canon)  law  were  revived.  The  Italian  cities  stood  with  the 
Papacy  in  the  struggles  with  the  German  kings,  and,  in  1167, 
those  in  the  Valley  of  the  Po  formed  what  was  known  as  the 
Lombard  League  for  defense.  Under  the  pressure  of  German 
oppression  they  now  began  a  careful  study  of  the  known  Roman 
law  in  an  effort  to  discover  some  charter,  edict,  or  grant  of  power 
upon  which  they  could  base  their  claim  for  independent  legal 
rights.  The  result  was  that  the  study  of  Roman  law  was  given 
an  emphasis  unknown  in  Italy  since  the  days  of  the  old  Empire. 
What  had  been  preserved  during  the  period  of  disorder  at  last 
came  to  be  understood,  additional  books  of  the  law  were  discov- 
ered, and  men  suddenly  awoke  to  a  realization  that  what  had 
been  before  considered  as  of  little  value  actually  contained  much 
that  was  worth  studying,  as  well  as  many  principles  of  import- 
ance that  were  applicable  to  the  conditions  and  problems  of  the 
time. 

The  great  student  and  teacher  of  law  of  the  period  was  Imerius 
of  Bologna  (c.  1070-1137),  who  began  to  lecture  on  the  Code  and 
the  Institutes  of  Justinian  about  mo  to  1115,  and  soon  attracted 
large  numbers  of  students  to  hear  his  interpretations.  Law  now 


INFLUENCES  TOWARD  A  REVIVAL       103 

ceased  to  be  a  part  of  Rhetoric  and  became  a  new  subject  of  study, 
with  a  body  of  material  large  enough  to  occupy  a  student  for  sev- 
eral years.  This  was  an  event  of  great  intellectual  significance.  A 
new  study  was  now  evolved  which  offered  great  possibilities  for 
intellectual  activity  and  the  exercise  of  the  critical  faculty,  while 
at  the  same  time  showing  veneration  for  authority.  _Law  was 
thus  placed  alongside  Theology  as  a  professional  subject,  and  the 
evolution  of  the  professional  lawyer  from  the  priest  was  now  for 
the  first  time  made  possible.  "^ 

Canon  law  also  organized  as  a  subject  of  study.  Inspired  by 
the  revival  of  the  study  of  civil  law,  a  monk  of  Bologna,  Gratian 
by  name,  set  himself  to  make  a  compilation  of  all  the  Church 
canons  which  had  been  enacted  since  the  Council  of  Nicaea  (325) 
formulated  the  first  twenty  (p.  51),  and  of  the  rules  for  church 
government  as  laid  down  by  the  church  authorities.  This  he 
issued  in  textbook  form,  about  1148,  under  the  title  of  Decretum 
Gratiani.  So  successful  were  his  efforts  that  his  compilation  was 
"one  of  those  great  textbooks  that  take  the  world  by  storm."  It 
did  for  canon  (church)  law  what  the  rediscovery  of  the  Justinian 
Code  had  done  for  civil  law;  that  is,  it  organized  canon  law  as  a 
new  and  important  teaching  subject.  Canon  Law  was  thus  sepa- 
rated from  Theology  and  added  to  Civil  Law  as  another  new  sub- 
ject of  study  for  both  theological  and  legal  students,  and  the  two 
subjects  of  Canon  and  Civil  Law  came  to  constitute  the  work  of  the 
law  faculties  in  the  universities  which  soon  arose  in  western  Europe. 

The  beginnings  of  medical  study.  The  Greeks  had  made  some 
distinct  progress  in  the  beginnings  of  the  study  of  disease.  Aris- 
totle had  given  some  anatomical  knowledge  in  his  writings  on  ani- 
mals, and  had  theorized  a  little  about  the  functions  of  the  human 
body.  The  real  founder  of  medical  science,  though,  was  Hippo- 
crates, of  the  island  of  Cos  (c.  460-367  B.C.),  a  contemporary  of 
Plato.  He  was  the  first  writer  on  the  subject  who  attempted  to 
base  the- practice  of  the  healing  art  on  careful  observation  and  sci- 
entific principles.  He  substituted  scientific  reason  for  the  wrath 
of  offended  deities  as  the  causes  of  disease,  and  tried  to  offer  proper 
remedies  in  place  of  sacrifices  and  prayers  to  the  gods  for  cures. 
His  descriptions  of  diseases  were  wonderfully  accurate,  and  his 
treatments  ruled  medical  practice  for  ages.  He  knew,  however, 
little  as  to  anatomy.  Another  Greek  writer,  Galen  (131-201 
A.D.),  wrote  extensively  on  medicine  and  left  an  anatomical  ac- 
count of  the  human  body  which  was  unsurpassed  for  more  than  a 


I04       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

thousand  years.    His  work  was  known  and  used  by  the  Saracens. 

During  the  early  Middle  Ages  the  Greek  medical  knowledge 
practically  disappeared,  and  in  its  place  came  the  Christian  the- 
ories of  Satanic  influence,  diabolic  action,  and  divine  punishment 
for  sin.  Correspondingly  the  cures  were  prayers  at  shrines  and 
repositories  of  sacred  relics  and  images,  which  were  found  all  over 
Europe,  and  to  which  the  injured  or  fever-stricken  peasants  hied 
themselves  to  make  offerings  and  to  pray,  and  then  hope  for  a 
miracle. 

Toward  the  middle  of  the  eleventh  century  ancient  Salerno, 
a  small  city  delightfully  situated  on  the  Italian  coast  thirty-four 
miles  south  of  Naples,  began  to  attain  some  reputation  as  a  health 
resort.  In  part  this  was  due  to  the  climate  and  in  part  to  its 
mineral  springs.  Southern  Italy  had,  more  than  any  other  part 
of  western  Europe,  retained  touch  with  old  Greek  thought.  The 
works  of  Hippocrates  and  Galen  had  been  preserved  there,  the 
monks  at  Monte  Cassino  had  made  some  translations,  and  some- 
time toward  the  middle  of  the  eleventh  century  the  study  of  the 
Greek  medical  books  was  revived  here.  The  Mohammedan  med- 
ical work  by  Avicenna  also  early  became  known  at  Salerno  in 
translation.  About  1065  Constantine  of  Carthage,  a  converted 
Jew  and  a  learned  monk,  who  had  traveled  extensively  in  the  East 
and  who  had  been  forced  to  flee  from  his  native  city  because  of  a 
suspicion  of  "black  art,"  began  to  lecture  at  Salerno  on  the  Greek 
and  Mohammedan  medical  works  and  the  practice  of  the  medical 
art.  In  1099  Robert,  Duke  of  Normandy,  returning  from  the 
First  Crusade,  stopped  here  to  be  cured  of  a  wound,  and  he  and 
his  knights  later  spread  the  fame  of  Salerno  all  over  Europe. 
The  result  was  the  revival  of  the  study  of  Medicine  in  the  West, 
and  Salerno  developed  into  the  first  of  the  medical  schools  of 
Europe.  Montpellier,  in  southern  France,  also  became  another 
early  center  for  the  study  of  Medicine,  drawing  much  of  its  med- 
ical knowledge  from  Spain.  Another  new  subject  of  professional 
study  was  now  made  possible,  and  Faculties  of  Medicine  were  in 
time  organized  in  most  of  the  universities  as  they  arose.  The 
instruction,  though,  was  chiefly  book  instruction,  Galen  being  the 
great  textbook  until  the  seventeenth  centuryi 

IV.  OTHER  NEW  INFLUENCES  AND  MOVEMENTS 
The  Crusades.    Perhaps  the  most  romantic  happenings  during 
the  Middle  Ages  were  that  series  of  adventurous  expeditions  to 


INFLUENCES  TOWARD  A  REVIVAL        105 

the  then  Far  East,  undertaken  by  the  kings  and  knights  of  western 
Europe  in  an  attempt  to  reclaim  the  Holy  Land  from  the  infidel 
Turks,  who  in  the  eleventh  century  had  pushed  in  and  were 
persecuting  Christian  pilgrims  journeying  to  Jerusalem.  In 
/  1095  Pope  Urban,  in  a  stirring  address  to  the  Council  of  Clermont 
(France),  issued  a  call  to  the  lords,  knights,  and  foot  soldiers  of 
western  Christendom  to  cease  destroying  their  fellow  Christians 
in  private  warfare,  and  to  turn  their  strength  of  arms  against  the 
infidel  and  rescue  the  Holy  Land.  The  journey  was  to  take  the 
place  of  penance  for  sin,  many  special  privileges  were  extended 
to  those  who  went,  and  those  who  died  on  the  journey  or  in  battle 
with  the  infidels  were  promised  entrance  into  heaven.  To  many 
nobles  and  peasants,  filled  with  a  desire  for  adventure  and  a  sense 
of  personal  sin,  no  surer  way  of  satisfying  either  was  to  be  found 
than  the  long  pUgrimage  to  the  Saviour's  tomb.  In  France  and 
England  the  call  met  with  instant  response.  Unfortunately  for 
the  future  of  civilization,  the  call  met  with  but  small  response 
from  the  nobles  of  German  lands. 

Results  of  the  Crusades  on  western  Europe.  In  a  sense  the 
Crusades  were  an  outward  manifestation  of  the  great  change  in 
thinking  and  ideals  which  had  begun  sometime  before  in  western 
Europe.  They  were  at  once  both  a  sign  and  a  cause  of  further 
change.  The  old  isolation  was  at  last  about  to  end,  and  inter- 
communication and  some  common  ideas  and  common  feelings 
were  being  brought  about.  Both  those  who  went  and  those  who 
remained  at  home  were  deeply  stirred  by  the  movement.  Chris- 
tendom as  a  great  international  community,  in  which  all  alike 
were  interested  in  a  common  ideal  and  in  a  common  fight  against 
the  infidel,  was  a  new  idea  now  dawning  upon  the  mass  of  the 
people,  whereas  before  it  had  been  but  little  understood. 

The  travel  to  distant  lands,  the  sight  of  cities  of  wealth  and 
power,  and  the  contact  with  peoples  decidedly  superior  to  them- 
selves in  civilization,  not  only  excited  the  imagination  and  led  to 
a  broadening  of  the  minds  of  those  who  returned,  but  served  as 
well  to  raise  the  general  level  of  intelligence  in  western  Europe. 
Some  new  knowledge  also  was  brought  back,  but  that  was  not  at 
the  time  of  great  importance.  The  principal  gain  came  in  the 
elimination  forever  of  thousands  of  quarreling,  fighting  noble- 
men, thus  giving  the  kingly  power  a  chance  to  consolidate  hold- 
ings and  begin  the  evolution  of  modem  States;  in  the  marked 
change  of  attitude  toward  the  old  problems;  in  the  awakening  of 


io6        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

a  new  interest  in  the  present  world ;  in  the  creation  of  new  inter- 
ests and  new  desires  among  the  common  people ;  in  the  awakening 
of  a  spirit  of  religious  unity  and  of  national  consciousness;  and 
especially  in  the  awakening  of  a  new  intellectual  life,  which  soon 
found  expression  in  the  organization  of  universities  for  study  and 
in  more  extensive  travel  and  geographical  exploration  than  the 
world  had  known  since  the  days  of  ancient  Rome.  The  greatest 
of  all  the  results,  however,  came  through  the  revival  of  trade, 
commerce,  manufacturing,  and  industry  in  the  rising  cities  of 
western  Europe,  with  the  consequent  evolution  of  a  new  and  im- 
portant class  of  merchants,  bankers,  and  craftsmen,  who  formed 
a  new  city  class  and  in  time  developed  a  new  system  of  training 
y  for  themselves  and  their  children. 
\V  The  revival  of  city  life.  The  old  cities  of  central  and  northern 
Italy,  as  was  stated  above  (p.  102),  continued  through  the  early 
Middle  Ages  as  places  of  some  little  local  importance.  In  the 
eleventh  century  they  overthrew  in  large  part  the  rule  of  their 
Prince-Bishops,  and  became  little  City- Republics,  much  after  the 
old  Greek  model.  Outside  of  Italy  almost  the  only  cities  not 
destroyed  during  the  period  of  the  barbarian  invasions  were  the 
episcopal  cities,  that  is  cities  which  were  the  residences  of  bishops. 

After  about  the  year  1000  a  revival  of  something  like  city  life 
begins  to  be  noticeable  here  and  there  in  the  records  of  the  time 
(R.  94  a),  and  by  iioo  these  signs  begin  to  manifest  themselves 
in  many  places  and  lands.  By  1200  the  cities  of  Europe  were 
numerous,  though  small,  and  their  importance  in  the  life  of  the 
times  was  rapidly  increasing  (R.  94  b). 

The  rise  of  a  city  class.  As  the  mediaeval  towns  increased  in 
size  and  importance  the  inhabitants,  being  human,  demanded 
rights.  Between  iioo  and  i2cx>  there  were  frequent  revolts  of 
the  people  of  the  mediaeval  towns  against  their  feudal  overlord, 
and  frequent  demands  were  made  for  charters  granting  privileges 
to  the  towns.  Sometimes  these  insurrections  were  put  down  with 
a  bloody  hand.  Sometimes,  on  the  contrary,  the  overlord  granted 
a  charter  of  rights,  willingly  or  unwillingly,  and  freed  the  people 
from  obligation  to  labor  on  the  lands  in  return  for  a  fixed  money 
payment.  Sometimes  the  king  himself  granted  the  inhabitants  a 
charter  by  way  of  curbing  the  power  of  the  local  feudal  lord  or 
bishop.  The  towns  became  exceedingly  skillful  in  playing  off 
lord  against  bishop,  and  the  king  against  both.  In  England, 
Flanders,  France^  and  Germany  some  of  the  towns  had  become 


INFLUENCES  TOWARD  A  REVIVAL        107 

wealthy  enough  to  purchase  their  freedom  and  a  charter  at  some 
tune  when  their  feudal  overlord  was  particularly  in  need  of  money. 
These  charters,  or  birth  certificates  for  the  towns,  were  carefully 
drawn  and  officially  sealed  documents  of  great  value,  and  were 
\iighly  prized  as  evidences  of  local  liberty.  The  document  created 
1  "free  town,"  and  gave  to  the  inhabitants  certain  specified  rights 
as  to  self-government,  the  election  of  magistrates  —  aldermen, 
mayor,  burgomaster  —  the  lev^'ing  and  payment  of  taxes,  and 
the  military  service  to  be  rendered.  Before  the  evolution  of 
strong  national  governments  these  charters  created  hundreds  of 
what  were  virtually  little  City-States  throughout  Europe  (R.  95). 
In  these  towns  a  new  estate  or  class  of  people  was  now  created 
(R.  96) ,  in  between  the  ruling  bishops  and  lords  on  the  one  hand 

(and  the  peasants  tilling  the  land  on  the  other.  These  were  the 
citizens  —  freemen,  bourgeoisie,  burghers.  Out  of  this  new  class 
of  city  dwellers  new  social  orders  —  merchants,  bankers,  trades- 
men, artisans,  and  craftsmen  —  in  time  arose,  and  these  new 
orders  soon  demanded  rights  and  obtained  some  form  of  educa- 
tion for  their  children.  The  guild  or  apprenticeship  education 
which  early  developed  in  the  cities  to  meet  the  needs  of  artisans 
and  craftsmen  (R.  99),  and  the  burgh  or  city  schools  of  Europe, 
which  began  to  develop  in  the  thirteenth  and  fourteenth  centu- 
ries, were  the  educational  results  of  the  rise  of  cities  and  the 
evolution  of  these  new  social  classes.  The  time  would  soon  be 
ripe  for  the  mysteries  of  learning  to  be  passed  somewhat  farther 
down  the  educational  pyramid,  and  new  classes  in  society  would 
begin  the  mastery  of  its  symbols. 

Education  for  these  new  social  classes.    With  the  evolution  of 
these  new  social  classes  an  extension  of  education  took  place 

Vthrough  the  formation  of  guilds./  The  merchants  of  the  Middle 
Ages  traded,  not  as  individuals,  nor  as  subjects  of  a  State  which 
protected  them,  for  there  were  as  yet  no  such  States,  but  as 
members  of  the  guild^of  merchants  of  their  town, (or  as  members 
of  a  trading  company^  Later,  towns  united  to  form  trading  con- 
federations, of  which  the  Hanseatic  League  of  northern  Germany 
was  a  conspicuous  example.  These  burgher  merchant  guilds 
became  wealthy  and  important  socially ;  they  were  chartered  by 
kings  and  given  trading  privileges  analogous  to  those  of  a  modem 
corporation  (R.  95) ;  they  elbowed  their  way  into  affairs  of  State, 
and  in  time  took  over  in  large  part  the  city  governments;  they 
obtained  education  for  themselves,  and  fought  with  the  church 


io8        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

authorities  for  the  creation  of  independent  burgh  schools;  they 
began  to  read  books,  and  books  in  the  vernacular  began  to  be 
.written  for  them;  they  in  time  vied  with  the  clergy  and  the 
nobility  in  their  patronage  of  learning;  they  everywhere  stood 
with  the  kings  and  princes  to  compel  feudal  lords  to  stop  warfare 
and  plundering  and  to  submit  to  law  and  order;  and  they  enter- 
tained royal  personages  and  drew  nobles,  clergy,  and  gentry  into 
their  honorary  membership, i  thus  serving  as  an  important  agency 
in  breaking  down  the  social-class  exclusiveness  of  the  Middle  Ages.  ^ 
In  these  guilds,  which  were  self-governing  bodies  debating  ques- 
tions and  deciding  policies  and  actions,  much  elementary  political 
training  was  given  their  members  which  proved  of  large  impor- 
tance at  a  later  time  (R.  96). 

In  the  same  way  the  craft  guilds  rendered  a  large  educational 
service  to  the  small  merchant  and  worker  J  as  they  provided  the 
technical  and  social  education  of  such  during  the  later  period  of 
the  Middle  Ages  and  in  early  modem  times,  and  protected  their 
members  from  oppression  in  an  age  when  oppression  was  the  rule?) 
\  With  the  revival  of  trade  and  industry  craft  guilds  arose  all  over 
western  Europe.    One  of  the  first  of  these  was  the  candle-makers' 
y     guild,  organized  at  Paris  in  1061.  i  Soon  after  we  find  large  num- 
^     bers  of  guilds  —  masons,  shoemakers,  harness-makers,  bakers, 
^,_^  smiths,  wool-combers,  tanners,  saddlers,  spurriers,  weavers,  goid- 
^^'^  smiths,    pewterers,   carpenters,   leather- workers,    cloth-workers, 
pinners,  fishmongers,  butchers,  barbers  —  all  organized  on  much 
the  same  plan.     These  were  the  working-men's  fraternities  or 
labor  unions  of  mediseval  Europe.     Each  trade  or  craft  became 
organized  as  a  city  guild,  composed  of  the  "masters,"  "journey- 
men" (paid  workmen),  and  "apprentices."    The  great  mediaeval 
document,  a  charter  of  rights  guaranteeing  protection,  was  usu- 
,H    ally  obtained.     The  guild  for  each  trade  laid  down  rules  for  the 
,    J    number  and.  training  of  apprentices,  the  conditions  under  which 
1  ^^    a  "journeyman"  could  become  a  "master,"  rules  for  conducting 
^  :'    the  trade,  standards  to  be  maintained  in  workmanship,  prices  to 
;    •  V    be  charged,  and  dues  and  obligations  of  members  (R.  97).  ^  They 
I     y  supervised  work  in  their  craft,  cared  for  the  sick,  buried  the^ead, 
.     ^  and  looked  after  the  widows  and  orphans.     Often  they  provided 
'  "s^  one  or  more  priests  of  their  own  to  minister  to  the  families  of  their 
^  craft,  and  gradually  the  custom  arose  of  having  the  priest  also 
-"^   teach  something  of  the  rudiments  of  religion  and  learning  to  the 
^    children  of  the  members^     In  time  money  and  lands  were  set 


> 


INFLUENCES  TOWARD  A  REVIVAL        109 

aside  or  left  for  such  purposes,  and  a  form  of  chantry  school, 
which  later  evolved  into  a  regular  school,  often  with  instruction 
'       in  higher  studies  added,  was  created  for  the  children  of  members 
of  the  guild  (R.  98).^  x 

Apprenticeship  education.  (^For  centuries  after  the  revival  of 
trade  and  industry  all  manufacturing  was  on  a  small  scale,  and 
in  the  home-industry  stage.    There  was,  of  course,  no  machinery, 
and  only  the  simple  tools  known  from  ancient  times  were  used: 
^      In  a  first-floor  room  at  the  back,  master,  journeymen,  and  appren- 
\      tices  working  together  made  the  articles  which  were  sold  by  the  ^ 
^     master  or  the  master's  wife  and  daughter  in  the  room  in  front.J 
■^     The  manufacturer  and  merchant  were  one.     Apprentices  were 
^     bound  to  a  master  for  a  term  of  years  (R.  99),  often  paying  for  the 
f —   training  and  education  to  be  received,  and  the  master  boarded  and 
^^^  lodged  both  the  apprentices  and  the  paid  workmen  in  the  family 
L      rooms  above  the  shop  and  store. 
5  The  form  of  apprenticeship  education  and  training  which  thus     \ 

>  developed,  from  an  educational  point  of, view,  forms  for  us  the    >3 
important  feature  of  the  history  of  these  craft  guilds.     With  the 
subdivision  of  labor  and  the  development  of  new  trades  the  craft- 

I  guild  idea  was  extended  to  the  new  occupations,  and  a  steady 
[  stream  of  rural  labor  flowing  to  the  towns  was  absorbed  by  them 
\  and  taught  the  elements  of  social  usages,  self-government,"  and  "^ 
the  mastery  of  a  trade.  Throughout  all  the  long  period  up  to  the  " 
nineteenth  century  this  apprenticeship  education  in  a  trade  and  £ 
in  self-government  constituted  almost  the  entire  formal  educa-  -1 
tion  the  worker  with  his  hands  received.  The  sons  of  the  bar- 
barian invaders,  as  well  as  their  knightly  brothers,  at  last  were 
busy  learning  the  great  lessons  of  industry,  cooperation,  and  per- 
sonal loyalty.  Here  begins,  for  western  Europe,  "  the  nobility  of 
labor  —  the  long  pedigree  of  toil.'*  So  well  in  fact  did  this  appren- 
tice system  of  training  and  education  meet  the  needs  of  the  time 
that  it  persisted,  as  was  said  above,  well  into  the  nineteenth 
century  (Rs.  200,  201,  242,  243),  being  displaced  only  by  modem 

>  power  machinery  and  systematized  factory  methods.  During 
0  the  later  Middle  Ages  and  in  modem  times  it  rendered  an  impor- 
:i     tant  educational  service;  in  the  later  nineteenth  century  it  became 

such  an  obstacle  to  educational  and  industrial  progress  that  it  has 
had  to  be  supplemented  or  replaced  by  systematic  vocational 
education. 
Influence  of  these  new  movements.    We  thus  see,  by  the  end 


7^ 

4 


V 


1 


no       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

of  the  tweKth  century,  a  number  of  new  influences  in  western 
Europe  which  point  to  an  intellectual  awakening  and  to  the  rise 
(^of  a  new  educated  class,  separate  from  the  monks  and  clergy  on) 
the  one  hand  or  the  nobility  on  the  other,  and  to  the  awakening 
of  Europe  to  a  new  attitude  toward  life.  Saracen  learning,  filter- 
ing across  from  Spain,  had  added  materially  to  the  knowledge 
Europe  previously  had,  and  had  stimulated  new  intellectual  inter- 
ests. ;  Scholasticism  had  begun  its  great  work  of  reorganizing  and 
systematizing  theology,  which  was  destined  to  free  philosophy, 
hitherto  regarded  as  a  dangerous  foe  or  a  suspected  ally,  from 
theology  and  to  remake  entirely  the  teaching  of  the  subject. 
Civil  and  canon  law  had  been  created  as  wholly  new  professional 
-  subjects,  and  the  beginnings  of  the  teaching  of  medicine  had  been 
made.  Instead  of  the  old  Seven  Liberal  Arts  and  a  very  limited 
course  of  professional  study  for  the  clerical  office  being  the  entire 
curriculum,  and  Theology  the  one  professional  subject,  we  now 
find,  by  the  beginning  of  the  thirteenth  century,  a  number  of  new 
and  important  professional  subjects  of  large  future  significance  — 

r  subjects  destined  to  break  the  monopoly  of  theological  study  and 
put  an  end  to  logistic  hair-splitting.  The  next  step  in  the  history 
of  education  came  in  the  developmeht  of  institutions  where  think- 
5"*W  ing  and  teaching  could  be  carried  on  free  from  civil  or  ecclesiastical 
^  ^  control,  with  the  consequent  rise  of  an  independent  learned  class 
{  i  in  western  Europe.  This  came  with  the  rise  of  the  universities, 
J  V^^^^to  which  we  next  turn,  and  out  of  which  in  time  arose  the  future 
)  >)  independent  scholarship  of  Europe,  America,  and  the  world  in 
general. 

We  also  discover  a  series  of  new  movements,  connected  with 
the  Crusades,  the  rise  of  cities,  and  the  revival  of  trade  and  indus- 
try, all  of  which  clearly  mark  the  close  of  the  dark  period  of  the 
Middle  Ages.  ;  We  note,  too,  the  evolution  of  new  social  classes 
^/*^  —  a  new  Estate ) —  destined  in  time  to  eclipse  in  importance  both 
i  y  priest  and  noble'  and  to  become  for  long  the  ruHng  classes  of  the 
^  p  modem  world.  We  also  note  the  beginnings  of  an  important 
^  t  independent  system  of  education  for  the  hand- workers  which 
\  '^  sufficed  until  the  days  of  steam,  machinery,  and  the  evolution  of 
i  ^  the  factory  system.  The  eleventh  and  twelfth  centuries  were 
I  A  turning-points  of  great  significance  in  the  history  of  our  western 
}  ^  civilization,  and  with  the  opening  of  the  wonderful  thirteenth 
>  JA^^century  the  western  world  is  well  headed  toward  a  new  life  and 
5     ^     modem  ways  of  thinking. 


*     r 


^^^^!^/^^^^^^^  ^  ''^'''''f:jM4 


[VAT         .TTi     . 


QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 


1.  Why  is  it  that  a  strong  religious  control  is  never  favorable  to  originality 
in  thinking? 

2.  Would  it  be  possible  for  any  people  anywhere  in  the  world  to-day  to 
make  such  advances  as  were  made  af  Bagdad,  in  the  late  eighth  and  early 
ninth  centuries,  without  such  work  permanently  influencing  the  course 
of  civilization  and  learning  everywhere?    To  what  is  the  difference  due? 

3.  What  were  the  chief  obstacles  to  Europe  adopting  at  once  the  learning 
from  Mohammedan  Spain,  instead  of  waiting  centuries  to  discover  this 
learning  independently? 

4.  Why  did  Aristotle's  work  seem  of  much  greater  value  to  the  mediaeval 
scholar  than  the  Moslem  science?    What  are  the  relative  values  to-day?  - 

5.  Why  should  the  light  Uterature  of  Spain  be  spoken  of  as  a  gay  contagion? 
Did  this  Christian  attitude  toward  fiction  and  poetry  continue  long? 

6.  How  did  the  fact  that  Dialectic  (Logic)  now  became  the  great  subject 
of  study  in  itself  denote  a  marked  intellectual  advance?  What  was  the 
significance  of  the  prominence  of  this  study  for  the  future  of  thinking? 

7.  How  do  you  explain  the  all-absorbing  interest  in  scholasticism  during 
the  greater  part  of  a  century? 

8.  State  the  significance,  for  the  future,  of  the  revival  of  the  study  of  Roman 
law:  (c)  intellectually;  (6)  in  shaping  future  civiHzation. 

9.  How  do  you  explain  the  Christian  attitude  toward  disease,  and  the 
scientific  treatment  of  it?  Has  that  attitude  entirely  passed  away? 
Illustrate. 

10.  Why  was  it  such  a  good  thing  for  the  future  of  civiUzation  in  England 
and  France  that  so  many  of  its  nobihty  perished  in  the  Crusades? 

11.  State  a  number  of  ways  in  which  the  Crusade  movements  had  a  beneficial 
'  effect  on  western  Europe. 

12.  Contrast  a  mediaeval  guild  and  a  modem  labor  union.     A  guild  and  a 
\                modern  fraternal  and  benevolent  society. 

J  13.  Why  did  apprenticeship  education  continue  so  long  with  so  little  change, 
'^  when  it  is  now  so  rapidly  being  superseded? 

3^  14,  Does  the  rise  of  a  new  Estate  in  society  indicate  a  period  of  slow  or  rapid 
^.,^^  change?  Why  is  such  an  evolution  of  importance  for  education  and 
^  civilization?      .          ,  ^ 

^-  SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  selections  are  repro- 
duced: 

85.  Draper:  The  Moslem  Civilization  in  Spain. 

86.  Draper:  Learning  among  the  Moslems  in  Spain. 

87.  Norton:  Works  of  Aristotle  known  by  1300. 

88.  Averroes:  On  Aristotle's  Greatness. 

89.  Roger  Bacon:  How  Aristotle  was  received  at  Oxford. 

90.  Statutes:  How  Aristotle  was  received  at  Paris, 
(a)  Decree  of  Church  Council,  12 10  a.d. 
{h)  Statutes  of  Papal  Legate,  1215  a.d. 
(c)  Statutes  of  Pope  Gregory,  1231  a.d. 
{d)  Statutes  of  the  Masters  of  Arts,  1254  A.D. 

91.  Cousin:  Abelard's  Sic  et  Non. 
(a)  From  the  Introduction. 
\b)  Types  of  Questions  raised  for  Debate. 


112       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

92.  Rashdall:  The  Great  Work  of  the  Schoolmen. 

93.  Justinian :  Preface  to  the  Justinian  Code. 

94.  Giry  and  Reville:  The  Early  Mediaeval  Town. 

(o)  To  the  Eleventh  Century. 
(b)  By  the  Thirteenth  Century. 

95.  Gross:  An  English  Town  Charter. 

96.  London:  Oath  of  a  New  Freeman  in  a  Mediaeval  Town. 

97.  Riley:  Ordinances  of  the  White-Tawyers'  Guild. 

98.  State  Report :  School  of  the  Guild  of  Saint  Nicholas. 

99.  England,  1396:  A  Mediaeval  Indenture  of  Apprenticeship. 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

*Adams,  G.  B.     Civilization  during  the  Middle  Ages. 

Ameer,  Ali.       A  Short  History  of  the  Saracens. 
*Ashley,  W.  J.    Introduction  to  English  Economic  History. 

Cutts,  Edw.  L.    Scenes  and  Characters  of  the  Middle  Ages. 
*Gautier,  Leon.     Chivalry. 
*Giry,  A.,  and  Reville,  A.    Emancipation  of  the  Mediceval  Towns. 

Hibbert,  F.  A.    Influence  and  Development  of  English  Guilds. 
*Hume,  M.  A.  S.     The  Spanish  People. 
*Lavisse,  Ernest.     Mediceval  Commerce  and  Industry. 
*MacCabe,  Jos.     Peter  Abelard. 
*Monro,  D.  C,  and  Sellery,  G.  E.     Medieval  Civilization. 

Poole,  R.  L.     Illustrations  of  Mediceval  Thought. 
*Rashdall,  H.'     Universities  of  Europe  in  the  Middle  Ages,  vol.  I. 

Routledge,  R.     Popular  History  of  Science. 

Sandys,  J.  E.     History  of  Classical  Scholarship,  vol.  i. 

Scott,  J.  F.    Historical  Essays  on  Apprenticeship  and  Vocational  Educa- 
tion.    (England.) 
*Sedgwick,  W.  J.,  and  Tyler,  H.  W.    A  Short  History  of  Science. 

Taylor,  H.  C.     The  Mediceval  Mind. 

Thorndike,  Lynn.     History  'of  Mediceval  Europe. 

Townsend,  W.  J.     The  Great  Schoolmen  of  the  Middle  Ages. 


CHAPTER  IX 
THE  RISE  OF  THE  UNIVERSITIES 

Evolution  of  the  Studium  Generate.  In  the  preceding  chapter 
we  described  briefly  the  new  movement  toward  association 
which  characterized  the  eleventh  and  the  twelfth  centuries  —  the 
municipal  movement,  the  merchant  guilds,  the  trade  guilds,  etc. 
These  were  doing  for  civU  life  what  monasticism  had  earlier  done 
for  the  religious  life.  They  were  collections  of  like-minded  men, 
who  united  themselves  into  associations  or  guilds  for  mutual 
benefit,  protection,  advancement,  and  self-government  within  the 
limits  of  their  city,  business,  trade,  or  occupation.  This  tendency 
toward  association,  in  the  days  when  state  government  was  weak 
or  in  its  infancy,  was  one  of  the  marked  features  of  the  transition 
time  from  the  early  period  of  the  Middle  Ages,  when  the  Church 
was  virtually  the  State,  to  the  later  period  of  the  Middle  Ages, 
when  the  authority  of  the  Church  in  secular  matters  was  begin- 
ning to  weaken,  modem  nations  were  beginning  to  form,  and  an 
interest  in  worldly  affairs  was  beginning  to  replace  the  previous 
inordinate  interest  in  the  world  to  come. 

We  also  noted  in  the  preceding  chapters  that  certain  cathe- 
dral and  monastery  schools,  but  especially  the  cathedral  schools, 
stimulated  by  the  new  interest  in  Dialectic,  were  developing  into 
much  more  than  local  teaching  institutions  designed  to  afford  a 
supply  of  priests  of  some  little  education  for  the  parishes  of  the 
bishopric.  Once  York  and  later  Canterbury,  in  England,  had 
had  teachers  who  attracted  students  from  other  bishoprics.  P^xis.. 
had  for  long  been  a  famous  center  for  the  study  of  the  Liberal 
Arts-and  of  Theology.  Saint  Gall  had  become  noted  for  its  music. 
Theologians  coming  from  Paris  (1167-68)  had  given  a  new  im- 
petus to  study  among  the  monks  at  Oxford.  A  series  of  political 
events  in  northern  Italy  had  given  emphasis  to  the  study  of  law 
in  many  cities,  and  the  Moslems  in  SpaiJi  had  stimulated  the 
schools  there  and  in  southern  France  to  a  study  of  medicine  and 
Aristotelian  science.  Rome, was  for  long  a  noted  center  for  study. 
Gradually  these  places  came  to  be  known  as  studia  puhlica,  or 
studia  generalia,  meaning  by  this  a  generally  recognized  place  of 
study,  where  lectures  were  open  to  any  one,  to  students  of  all 
countries  and  of  all  conditions.     Traveling  students  came  to 


114       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

these  places  from  afar  to  hear  some  noted  teacher  read  and  com- 
ment on  the  famous  textbooks  of  the  time  (R.  loi). 

The  university  evolution.     The  development  of  a  university 
out  of  a  cathedral  or  some  other  form  of  school  represented,  in 


Fig.  22.  Showing  Location  of  the  Chief  Universities  founded 

BEFORE  1600 

the  Middle  Ages,  a  long  local  evolution.  Universities  were  not 
founded  then  as  they  are  to-day.  A  teacher  of  some  reputation 
drew  around  him  a  constantly  increasing  body  of  students. 
Other  teachers  of  ability,  finding  a  student  body  already  there, 
also  "set  up  their  clftirs"  and  began  to  teach.  Other  teachers 
and  more  students  came.  (^In  this  way  a  studium  was  created.^ 
About  these  teachers  in  time  collected  other  university  servants 
—  "pedells,  librarians,  lower  officials,  preparers  of  parchment, 
scribes,  illuminators  of  parchment,  and  others  who  serve  it,"  as 
Count  Rupert  enumerated  them  in  the  Charter  of  Foundation 
granted,  in  1386,  to  Heidelberg  (R.  103).    At  Salerno,  as  we  have 


THE  RISE  OF  THE  UNIVERSITIES         115 

already  seen  (p.  104),  medical  instruction  arose  around  the  work 
of  Constantine  of  Carthage  and  the  medicinal  springs  found  in 
the  vicinity.  Students  journeyed  there  from  many  lands,  and 
licenses  to  practice  the  medical  art  were  granted  there  as  early 
as  1 137.  At  Bologna,  we  have  also  seen  (p.  102),  the  work  of 
Imerius  and  Gratian  early  made  this  a  great  center  for  the  study 
of  civil  and  canon  law,  and  their  pupils  spread  the  taste  for  these 
new  subjects  throughout  Europe,  ^aris  for  two  centuries  had 
been  a  center  for  the  study  of  the  Arts~and  of^heolo^,  and  a 
succession  of  famous  teachers. 

The  guild  idea;  early  privileges.  By  the  beginning  of  the 
thirteenth  century  both  students  and  teachers  had  become  so 
numerous,  at  a  number  of  these  sludia  generalia  in  western  Europe, 
that  they  began  to  adopt  the  favorite  mediaeval  practice  and 
organized  themselves  into  associations,  or  guilds,  for  further 
protection  from  extortion  and  oppression  and  for  greater  freedom 
from  regulation  by  the  Church.  They  now  sought  and  obtained 
additional  privileges  for  themselves,  and,  in  particular,  the  great 
mediaeval  document  —  a  charter  of  rights  and  privileges.  As  both 
teachers  and  students  were  for  long  regarded  as  clerici  the 
charters  were  usually  sought  from  the  Pope,  but  in  some  cases 
they  were  obtained  from  the  king.  These  associations  of  schol- 
ars, or  teachers,  or  both,  "bom  of  the  need  of  companionship 
which  men  who  cultivate  their  intelligence  feel,"  sought  to  per- 
form the  same  functions  for  those  who  studied  and  taught  that 
the  merchant  and  craft  guilds  were  performing  for  their  members. 
The  ruling  idea  was  association  for  protection,  and  to  secure  free- 
dom for  discussion  and  study;  the  obtaining  of  corporate  rights 
and  responsibilities;  and  the  organization  of  a  system  of  appren- 
ticeship, based  on  study  and  developing  through  journeyman  into 
mastership,  as  attested  by  an  examination  and  the  hcense  to 
teach,  f  In  the  rise  of  these  teacher  and  student  guilds  we  have 
the  beginnings  of  the  universities  of  western  Europe,  and  their 
organization  into  chartered  teaching  groups  (R.  100)  was  simply 
another  phase  of  that  great  movement  toward  the  association  of 
like-minded  men  for  worldly  purposes  which  began  to  sweep  over 
the  rising  cities  in  the  eleventh  and  twelfth  centuries,  j 

One  of  the  most  important  privileges  which  the  imiversities 

early  obtained,  and  a  rather  singular  one  at  that,  was  the  right  of 

[^essatio,  which  meant  the  right  to  stop  lectures  and  go  on  a  strike 

as  a  means  of  enforcing  a  redress  of  grievances  against  either  town 


Ii6       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

or  church  authority  (R.  107).  This  right  was  for  long  Jealously- 
guarded  by  the  university,  and  frequently  used  to  defend  itself 
from  the  smallest  encroachments  on  its  freedom  to  teach,  study, 
and  discipline  the  members  of  its  guild  as  it  saw  fit,  and  often  the 
right  not  to  discipline  them  at  all.  Often  the  cessatio  was  invoked 
on  very  trivial  grounds,  as  in  the  case  of  the  Oxford  cessatio  of 
1209  (R.  108),  the  Paris  cessatio  of  1229  (R.  109),  and  the  numer- 
ous other  cessationes  which  for  two  centuries  repeatedly  disturbed 
the  continuity  of  instruction  at  Paris. 

Degrees  in  the  guild.  The  most  important  of  the  university 
rights,  however,  was  the  right  to  examine  and  license  its  own 
teachers  (R.  no),  and  to  grant  the  license  to  teach  (Rs.  in,  112). 
Founded  as  the  universities  were  after  the  guild  model,  they  were 
primarily  places  for  the  taking  of  apprentices  in  the  Arts,  devel- 
oping them  into  Journeymen  and  masters,  and  certifying  to  their 
proficiency  in  the  teaching  craft.  Their  purpose  at  first  was  to 
prepare  teachers,  and  the  giving  of  instruction  to  students  for 
cultural  ends,  or  a  professional  training  for  practical  use  aside 
from  teaching  the  subject,  was  a  later  development. 

Accordingly  it  came  about  in  time  that,  after  a  number  of  years 
of  study  in  the  Arts  under  some  master,  a  student  was  permitted 
to  present  himself  for  a  test  as  to  his  ability  to  define  words, 
determine  the  meaning  of  phrases,  and  read  the  ordinary  Latin 
texts  in  Grammar,  Rhetoric,  and  Logic  (the  Trivium),  to  the  satis- 
faction of  other  masters  than  his  own.  In  England  this  test  came 
to  be  known  by  the  term  determine.  Its  passage  was  equivalent 
to  advancing  from  apprenticeship  to  the  ranks  of  a  Journeyman, 
and  the  successful  candidate  might  now  be  permitted  to  assist  the 
master,  or  even  give  some  elementary  instruction  himself  while 
continuing  his  studies.  He  now  became  an  assistant  or  compan- 
ion, and  by  the  fourteenth  century  was  known  as  a  haccalaureus, 
a  term  used  in  the  Church,  in  chivalry,  and  in  the  guilds,  and 
which  meant  a  beginner.  There  was  at  first,  though,  no  thought 
of  establishing  an  examination  and  a  new  degree  for  the  comple- 
tion of  this  first  step  in  studies.  The  bachelor's  degree  was  a 
later  development,  sought  at  first  by  those  not  intending  to 
teach,  and  eventually  erected  into  a  separate  degree. 

When  the  student  had  finally  heard  a  sufficient  number  of 
courses,  as  required  by  the  statutes  of  his  guild,  he  might  present 
himself  for  examination  for  the  teaching  license.  This  was  a 
public  trial,  and  took  the  form  of  a  public  disputation  on  some 


THE  RISE  OF  THE  UNIVERSITIES         117 


stated  thesis,  in  the  presence  of  the  masters,  and  against  all 
comers.  It  was  the  student's  "masterpiece,"  analogous  to  the 
masterpiece  of  any  other  guild,  and  he  submitted  it  to  a  jury  of 
the  masters  of  his  craft.  Upon  his  masterpiece  being  adjudged 
satisfactory,  he  also  became  a  master  in  his  craft,  was  now  able 
to  define  and  dispute,  was  formally  admitted  to  the  highest  rank 
in  the  teaching  guild,  might  have  a  seal,  and  was  variously  known 
as  master,  doctor,  or  professor,  all  of  which  were  once  synony- 
mous terms.  If  he  wished  to  prepare  himself  for  teaching  one 
of  the  professional  subjects  he  studied  still  further,  usually  for 
a  mmiber  of  years,  in  one  of  the  professional  faculties,  and  in  time 
he  was  declared  to  be  a  Doctor  of  Law,  or  Medicine,  or  of  The- 
ology. 

The  teaching  faculties.  On  the  side  of  the  students  the  imi- 
versity  organization  was  by  nations;  on  the  side  of  the  masters 
the  organization  was  by  teaching  subjects,  and  into  what  came 
to  be  known  2iS  faculties. 

The  Arts  Faculty  was  the  successor  of  the  old  cathedral-school 
instruction  in  the  Seven  Liberal  Arts,  and  was  found  in  practically 
all  the  universities. 
The  Law  Faculty  em- 
braced civil  and  canon 
law,  as  worked  out  at 
Bologna.  The  Med- 
ical Faculty  taught 
the  knowledge  of  the 
medical  art,  as  worked 
out  at  Salerno  and 
Montpellier.  The  The- 
ological Faculty,  the 
most  important  of  the 
four,  prepared  learned 
men  for  the  service  of 
the  Church,  and  was 
for  some  two  cen- 
turies controlled  by 
the  scholastics.  The 
Arts  Faculty  was  preparatory  to  the  other  three.  As  Latin  was 
the  language  of  the  classroom,  and  all  the  texts  were  Latin  texts, 
a  reading  and  speaking  knowledge  of  Latin  was  necessary  before 
coming  to  the  university  to  study. 


Fig.  23.  New  College,  at  Oxford 
One  of  the  oldest  of  the  Oxford  colleges,  having  been 
founded  in  1379.  The  picture  shows  the  chapel,  clois- 
ters (consecrated  in  1400),  and  a  tall  tower,  once 
forming  a  part  of  the  Oxford  city  walls. 


.Ii8       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

This  was  obtained  from  a  study  of  the  first  of  the  Seven  Arts 
—  Grammar  —  in  some  monastery,  cathedral,  or  other  type  of 
school.  Thus  a  knowledge  of  Latin  formed  practically  the  sole 
requirement  for  admission  to  the  mediaeval  university,  and  con- 
tinued to  be  the  chief  admission  requirement  in  our  universities 
up  to  the  nineteenth  century  (R.  i86  a).  In  Europe  it  is  still  of 
great  importance  as  a  preparatory  subject,  but  in  South  American 
countries  it  is  not  required  at  all. 

Very  few  of  the  universities,  in  the  beginning,  had  all  four  of 
these  faculties.  The  very  nature  of  the  evolution  of  the  earlier 
ones  precluded  this.  Thus  Bologna  had  developed  into  a  studium 
generate  from  its  prominence  in  law,  and  was  virtually  constituted 
a  university  in  ^1158,  but  it  did  not  add  Medicine  until  1316,  or 
Theology  until  1360.-^  These  four  traditional  faculties  were  well 
established  by  the  fourteenth  century,  and  continued  as  the 
typical  form  of  imiversity  organization  until  modem  times.  With 
the  great  university  development  and  the  great  multiplication  of 
subjects  of  study  which  characterized  the  nineteenth  century, 
many  new  faculties  and  schools  and  colleges  have  had  to  be 
created,  particularly  in  the  United  States,  in  response  to  new 
modem  demands. 

Methods  of  instruction.  A  very  important  reason  why  so 
long  a  period  of  study  was  required  in  each  of  the  professional 
faculties,  as  well  as  in  the  Faculty  of  Arts,  is  to  be  found  in  the 
lack  of  textbooks  and  the  methods  of  instruction  followed.  While 
the  standard  textbooks  were  becoming  much  more  common,  due 
to  much  copying  and  the  long-continued  use  of  the  same  texts, 
they  were  still  expensive  and  not  owned  by  many.  To  provide 
a  loan  collection  of  theological  books  for  poor  students  we  find, 
\in  1 27 1,  a  gift  by  will  to  the  University  of  Paris  (R.  119)  of  a  pri- 
vate library,  containing  twenty-seven  booksy  Even  if  the  stu- 
dents possessed  books,  the  master  "read"  and  commented  from 
his  "gloss"  at  great  length  on  the  texts  being  studied.  Besides 
the  mere  text  each  teacher  had  a  "gloss"  or  commentary  for  it  — 
that  is,  a  mass  of  explanatory  notes,  summaries,  cross-references, 
opinions  by  others,  and  objections  to  the  statements  of  the  text. 
The  "gloss"  was  a  book  in  itself,  often  larger  than  the  text,  and 
these  standard  glosses,  or  commentaries,  were  used  in  the  uni- 
versity instruction  for  centuries.  In  Theology  and  Canon  Law 
they  were  particularly  extensive. 

It  win  be  seen  that  both  students  and  professors  were  bound  to 


THE  RISE  OF  THE  UNIVERSITIES         119 

the  text,  as  were  the  teachers  of  the  Seven  Liberal  Arts  in  the 
cathedral  schools  before  them.  There  was  no  appeal  to  the 
imagination,  still  less  to  observation,  experiment,  or  experience. 
Each  generation  taught  what  it  had  learned,  except  that  from 
time  to  time  some  thinker  made  a  new  organization,  or  some  new 
body  of  knowledge  was  unearthed  and  added. 

The  disputation;  equipment.  A  method  much  used  was  the 
disputation,  and  participation  in  a  number  of  these  was  required 
for  degrees  (R.  116).     These  were  logical  contests,  not  unlike  a 


Fig.  24.  Library  of  the  University  of  Leyden,  in  Holland 
(After  an  engraving  by  J.  C.  Woudanus,  dated  1610) 
This  shows  well  the  chained  books,  and  a  common  type  of  bookcase  in  use  in 
monasteries,  churches,  and  higher  schools.  Counting  35  books  to  the  case,  this 
shows  a  library  of  35  volumes  on  mathematics;  70  volumes  each  on  literature, 
philosophy,  and  medicine;  140  volumes  of  historical  books;  175  volumes  on  civil 
and  canon  law;  and  160  volumes  on  theology,  or  a  total  of  770  volumes  —  a  good- 
sized  library  for  the  time. 


modern  debate,  in  which  the  students  took  sides,  cited  authorities, 
and  summarized  arguments,  all  in  Latin.  Sometimes  a  student 
gave  an  exhibition  in  which  he  debated  both  sides  of  a  question, 
and  summarized  the  argument,  after  the  manner  of  the  professors. 
As  a  corrective  to  the  memorization  of  lectures  and  texts,  these 


I20       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

disputations  served  a  useful  purpose  in  awakening  intellectual 
vigor  and  logical  keenness.  They  were  very  popular  until  into 
the  sixteenth  century,  when  new  subject-matter  and  new  ways 
of  thinking  offered  new  opportunities  for  the  exercise  of  the  in- 
tellect. 

In  teaching  equipment  there  was  almost  nothing  at  first,  and 
but  little  for  centuries  to  come.  Laboratories,  workshops,  gym- 
nasia, good  buildings  and  classrooms  —  all  alike  were  equally  un- 
known. Time  schedules  of  lectures  (Rs.  122,  123)  came  in  but 
slowly,  in  such  matters  each  professor  being  a  free  lance.  Nor 
were  there  any  libraries  at  first,  though  in  time  these  developed. 

_  For  a  long  time  books  were  both  expensive  and  scarce  (Rs.  78, 119, 
120).  I  After  the  invention  of  printing  (first  book  printed  in  1456}^ 
university  libraries  increased  rapidly  and  soon  became  the 
chief  feature  of  the  university  equipment.  Figure  24  shows  the 
library  of  the  University  of  Leyden,  in  Holland,  thirty-five  years 
after  its  foundation,  and  about  one  hundred  and  fifty  years  after 
the  beginnings  of  printing.  It  shows  a  rather  large  increase  in 
the  size  of  book  collections  after  the  introduction  of  printing,  and 
a  good  library  organization. 

"h  Value  of  the  training  given.  Measured  in  terms  of  modem 
\  standards  the  instruction  was  undoubtedly  poor,  unnecessarily 
drawn  out,  and  the  educational  value  low.  We  could  now  teach 
as  much  information,  and  in  a  better  manner,  in  but  a  fraction 
of  the  time  then  required.  Viewed  also  by  the  standards  of  in- 
struction in  the  higher  schools  of  Greece  and  Rome  the  conditions 
were  almost  equally  bad.  Viewed,  though,  from  the  standpoint 
of  what  had  prevailed  in  western  Europe  during  the  dark  period 
of  the  early  Middle  Ages,  it  represented  a  marked  advance  in 
method  and  content  —  except  in  pure  literature,  where  there  was 
an  undoubted  decline  due  to  the  absorbing  interest  in  Dialectic  — 
and  it  particularly  marked  a  new  spirit,  as  nearly  critical  as  the 
times  would  allow.  Despite  the  heterogeneous  and  but  partially 
civilized  student  body,  youthful  and  but  poorly  prepared  for 
study,  the  drunkenness  and  fighting,  the  lack  of  books  and  equip- 
ment, the  large  classes  and  the  poor  teaching  methods,  and  the 
small  amount  of  knowledge  which  formed  the  grist  for  their  mills 
and  which  they  ground  exceeding  small,  these  new  universities 
held  within  themselves,  almost  in  embryo  form,  the  largest  prom- 
ise for  the  intellectual  future  of  western  Europe  which  had  ap- 
peared since  the  days  of  the  old  universities  of  the  Hellenic  world 


THE  RISE  OF  THE  UNIVERSITIES        121 

(R.  124).  In  these  new  institutions  knowledge  was  not  only 
preserved  and  transmitted,  but  was  in  time  to  be  tremendously 
advanced  and  extended.  They  were  the  first  organizations  to 
break  the  monopoly  of  the  Church  in  learning  and  teaching;  they 
were  the  centers  to  which  all  new  knowledge  gravitated;  under 
their  shadow  thousands  of  young  men  found  intellectual  compan- 
ionship and  in  their  classrooms  intellectual  stimulation;  and  in 
encouraging  "laborious  subtlety,  heroic  industry,  and  intense 
application,"  even  though  on  very  limited  subject-matter,  and  in 
training  "men  to  think  and  work  rather  than  to  enjoy"  (R.  124), 


Fig.  25.  a  University  Lecture  and  Lecture  Room 
(From  a  woodcut  printed  at  Strassburg,  1608) 


they  were  preparing  for  the  time  when  western  Europe  should 
awaken  to  the  riches  of  Greece  and  Rome  and  to  a  new  type  of 
intellectual  life  of  its  own.  From  these  beginningsV^e  university 
organization  has  persisted  and  grown  and  expanded,  and  to-day 
stands,  the  Catholic  Church  alone  excepted,  as  the  oldest  organ- 
ized institution  of  human  society. 

The  manifest  tendency  of  the  universities  toward  speculation, 
though  for  long  within  limits  approved  by  the  Church,  was  ulti- 
mately to  awaken  inquiry,  investigation,  rational  thinking,  and 
to  bring  forth  the  modem  spirit.    The  preservation  and  transmis- 


122       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

sion  of  knowledge  was  by  the  university  organization  transferred 
from  the  monastery  to  the  school,  from  monks  to  doctors,  and 
from  the  Church  to  a  body  of  logically  trained  men,  only  nomi- 
nally members  of  the  clerici. )  Their  success6rs  would  in  time  en- 
tirely break  away  from  connections  with  either  Church  or  State, 
and  stand  forth  as  the  independent  thinkers  and  scholars  in  the 
arts,  sciences,  professions,  and  even  in  Theology.  University 
graduates  in  Medicine  would  in  time  wage  a  long  struggle  against 
bigotry  to  lay  the  foundations  of  modem  medicine.  Graduates 
in  Law  would  contend  with  kings  and  feudal  lords  for  larger 
privileges  for  the  as  yet  lowly  common  man,  and  would  help  to 
usher  in  a  period  of  greater  political  equaHty.  The  university 
schools  of  Theology  were  in  time  to  send  forth  the  keenest  critics 
of  the  practices  of  the  Church.  Out  of  the  university  cloisters 
were  to  come  the  men  —  Dante,  Petrarch,  Wycliffe,  Huss,  Luther, 
Calvin,  Copernicus,  Galileo,  Newton  —  who  were  to  usher  in  the 
modern  spirit. 

The  universities  as  a  public  force.  '"Almost  from  the  first  the 
universities  availed  themselves  of  their  privileges  and  proclaimed 
a  bold  independence.  .  The  freedom  from  arrest  and  trial  by  the 
civil  authorities  for  petty  offenses,  or  even  for  murder,  and  the 
right  to  go  on  a  strike  if  in  any  jtvay  interfered  with,  were  but 
beginnings  in  independence  in  an  age  when  such  independence 
seemed  important.  These  rights  were  in  time  given  up,  and  in 
their  place  the  much  more  important  rights  of  liberty  to  study  as 
truth  seemed  to  lead,  freedom  in  teaching  as  the  master  saw  the 
truth,  and  the  right  to  express  themselves  as  an  institution  on  pub- 
lic questions  which  seemed  to  concern  them,  were  slowly  but  defi- 
nitely taken  on  in  place  of  the  earlier  privileges.  Virtually  a  new 
type  of  members  of  society  —  a  new  Estate  —  was  evolved,  rank- 
ing with  Church,  State,  and  nobility,  and  this  new  Estate  soon 
began  to  express  itself  in  no  uncertain  tones  on  matters  which 
concerned  both  Church  and  State.  '  The  universities  were  demo- 
cratic in  organization  and  became  democratic  in  spirit,  represent- 
ing a  heretofore  unknown  and  unexpressed  public  opinion  in 
western  Europe. 

In  an  age  of  oppression  these  university  organizations  stood  for 
freedom.  In  an  age  of  force  they  began  the  substitution  of  reason. 
In  the  centuries  from  the  end  of  the  Dark  Ages  to  the  Reformation 
they  were  the  homes  of  free  thought.  They  early  assumed  na- 
tional character  and  proclaimed  a  bold  independence.    Questions 


M  THE  RIS 


\^    "     J  t^  ly    ~       — 

RISE  OF  THE  UNIVERSITIES         123 


of  State  and  Church  they  discussed  with  a  freedom  before  un- 
known. They  presented  their  grievances  to  both  kings  and  popes, 
from  both  they  obtained  new  privileges,  to  both  they  freely  oflfered 
their  advice,  and  sometimes  both  were  forced  to  do  their  bidding. 
For  the  first  time  since  the  downfall  of  Rome  the  administration 
of  human  affairs  was  now  placed  once  more  in  the  hands  of  edu- 
cated men.  ]  By  the  interchange  of  students  from  all  lands  an^ 
their  hospitality,  such  as  it  was,  to  the  stranger,  the  universities 
tended  to  break  down  barriers  and  to  prepare  Europe  for  larger 
intercourse  and  for  more  of  a  common  life. 

On  the  masses  of  the  people,  of  course,  they  had  little  or  no 
influence,  and  could  not  have  for  centuries  to  come,  /iheir  great- 
est work,  as  has  been  the  case  with  universities  ever  since  their 
foundation]  was  that  of  drawing  to  their  classrooms  the  brightest 
minds  of  me  times,  the  most  capable  and  the  most  industrious, 
and  out  of  this  young  raw  material  training  the  leaders  of  the 
future  in  Church  and  State.  Educationally,  one  of  their  most 
important  services  was  in  creating  a  surplus  of  teachers  in  the 
Arts  who  had  to  find  a  market  for  their  abilities  in  the  rising 
secondary  schools.  These  developed  rapidly  after  1200,  and  to 
these  we  owe  a  somewhat  more  general  diffusion  of  the  little 
learning  and  the  intellectual  training  of  the  time.  In  preparing 
future  leaders  for  State  and  Church  in  law,  theology,  and  teaching, 
the  universities,  though  sometimes  opposed  and  their  opinions 
ignored,  nevertheless  contributed  materially  to  the  making  and 
moulding  of  national  history.)  The  first  great  result  of  their  work 
in  training  leaders  we  see  in  the  Renaissance  movement  of  the 
fourteenth  and  fifteenth  centuries,  to  which  we  next  turn.  In 
this  movement  for  a  revival  of  the  ancient  learning,  and  the  sub- 
sequent movements  for  a  purer  and  a  better  religious  life,  the  men 
trained  by  the  universities  were  the  leaders. 

^  ^  QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

1.  Why  would  the  studia  publica  tend  to  attract  a  different  type  of  scholar 
than  those  in  the  monasteries,  and  gradually  to  supersede  them  in 
importance? 

2.  Show  how  the  mediaeval  university  was  a  gradual  and  natural  evolution, 
as  distinct  from  a  founded  university  of  to-day. 

3.  Show  that  the  university  charter  was  a  first  step  toward  independence 
from  churck  and  state  control. 

4.  Show  the  relation  between  the  system  of  apprenticeship  developed  for 
student  and  teacher  in  a  mediaeval  university,  and  the  stages  of  stud«nt 
and  teacher  in  a  university  of  to-day. 


124       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

5.  Show  how  the  chartered  university  of  the  Middle  Ages  was  an  "associa- 
tion of  like-minded  men  for  worldly  purposes." 

6.  Do  university  professors  to-day  have  privileges  akin  to  those  granted 
professors  in  a  mediaeval  university? 

7.  What  has  caused  the  old  Arts  Faculty  to  break  up  into  so  many  groups, 
whereas  Law,  Medicine,  and  Theology  have  stayed  united? 

8.  Do  universities,  when  founded  to-day,  usually  start  with  all  four  of  the 
mediaeval  faculties  represented? 

9.  Which  of  the  professional  faculties  has  changed  most  in  the  nature  and 
character  of  its  instruction?     Why  has  this  been  so? 

10.  Enumerate  a  number  of  different  things  which  have  enabled  the  modem 
university  greatly  to  shorten  the  period  of  instruction? 

11.  Aside  from  differences  in  teachers,  why  are  some  university  subjects 
today  taught  much  more  compactly  and  economically  than  other 
subjects? 

12.  After  admitting  all  the  defects  of  the  mediaeval  university,  why  did  the 
university  nevertheless  represent  so  important  a  development  for  the 
future  of  western  civilization? 

13.  What  does  the  long  continuance,  without  great  changes  in  character, 
of  the  university  as  an  institution  indicate  as  to  its  usefulness  to  so- 
ciety? 

14.  Does  the  university  of  to-day  play  as  important  a  part  in  the  progress  of 
society  as  it  did  in  the  mediaeval  times?     Why? 

15.  Show  how  the  mediaeval  university  put  books  in  the  place  of  things, 
whereas  the  modern  university  tries  to  reverse  this. 

16.  Show  how  the  rise  of  the  universities  gave  an  educated  ruling  class  to 
Europe,  even  though  the  nobility  may  not  have  attended  them. 

17.  Show  how,  in  an  age  of  lawlessness,  the  universities  symbolized  the 
supremacy  of  mind  over  brute  force. 

18.  Show  how  the  mediaeval  universities  aided  civilization  by  breaking  down, 
somewhat,  barriers  of  nationality  and  ignorance  among  peoples. 

19.  Show  how  the  university  stood,  as  the  crowning  effort  of  its  time,  in  the 
slow  upward  struggle  to  rebuild  civilization  on  the  ruins  of  what  had  once 
been. 

SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  selections  are  repro- 
duced: 

100.  Rashdall  and  Minerv*:  University  Foundations  before  1600. 
loi.  Fr.  Barbarossa:  Privileges  for  Students  who  travel  for  Study. 

102.  Philip  Augustus:  Privileges  granted  Students  at  Paris. 

103.  Count  Rupert:  Charter  of  the  University  of  Heidelberg. 

104.  Philip  IV':  Exemption  of  Students  and  Masters  from  Taxation. 

105.  Vercelli:  Privileges  granted  to  the  University  by  the  City. 

106.  V'illani:  The  Cost  to  a  City  of  maintaining  a  University. 

107.  Pope  Gregory  IX:  Right  to  suspend  Lectures  (Cessatio). 

108.  Roger  of  Wendover:  a  Cessatio  at  Oxford. 

109.  Henry  III:  England  invites  Scholars  to  leave  Paris. 
no.  Pope  Gregory  IX:  Early  Licensing  of  Professors  to  teach. 

111.  Pope  Nicholas  IV:  The  Right  to  grant  Licenses  to  teach. 

112.  Rashdall:  A  University  License  to  teach.  • 

113.  Paris  Statutes,  1254:  Books  required  for  the  Arts  Degree. 

114.  Leipzig  Statutes,  1410:  Books  required  for  the  Arts  Degree. 

115.  Oxford  Statutes,  1408-31:  Books  required  for  the  Arts  Degree. 


THE  RISE  OF  THE  UNIVERSITIES         125 

116.  Oxford,  Fourteenth  Century:  Requirements  for  the  Professional 
Degrees. 

(a)  In  Theology.  (c)  In  Civil  Law. 

(b)  In  Canon  Law.  (d)  In  Medicine. 

117.  Paris  Statutes,  1270-74:  Requirements  for  the  Medical  Degree. 

118.  Roger  Bacon:  On  the  Teaching  of  Theology. 

119.  Master  Stephen:  Books  left  by  Will  to  the  University  of  Paris. 

120.  Roger  Bacon:  The  Scarcity  of  Books  on  Morals. 

121.  Balaeus:  Methods  of  Instruction  in  the  Arts  Faculty  of  Paris. 

122.  Toulouse:  Time-Table  of  Lectures  in  Arts,  1309. 

123.  Leipzig:  Time-Table  of  Lectures  in  Arts,  1519. 

124.  Rashdall:  Value  and  Influence  of  the  Mediaeval  University. 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

Boase,  Charles  William.    Oxford  (Historic  Towns  Series). 

Clark,  Andrew.     The  Colleges  at  Oxford. 

Clark,  J.  W.    Libraries  in  the  Mediceval  and  Renaissance  Periods. 
*Clark,  J.  W.     The  Care  of  Books. 

*Compayre,  G.    Abelard,  and  the  Origin  and  Early  History  of  the  Universi' 
ties. 

Corbin,  John.     An  American  at  Oxford. 
*Jebb,  R.  C.     The  Work  of  the  Universities  for  the  Nation. 

Mullinger,  J.  B.     History  of  the  University  of  Cambridge. 
*Norton,  A.  O.    Readings  in  the  History  of  Education;  Mediceval  Universir- 

ties. 
*Paetow,  L.  J.     The  Arts  Course  at  Mediceval  Universities.     (Univ.  Ill» 

Studies,  vol.  iii,  no.  7,  Jan.  1910). 
*Paulsen,  Fr.     The  German  Universities. 

Rait,  R.  S.    Life  of  a  Mediceval  University. 
*RashdaIl,  H.     Universities  of  Europe  in  the  Middle  Ages. 

Sandys,  J.  E,    History  of  Classical  Scholarship,  vol.  I. 

Sheldon,  Henry.    Student  Life  and  Customs. 


^c^^Ct 


JyiA^ 


PART  III 

THE  TRANSITION  FROM  MEDIEVAL  TO  MODERN 

ATTITUDES 

•      • 

THE  RECOVERY  OF  THE  ANCIENT  LEARNING 

THE  REAWAKENING  OF  SCHOLARSHIP 

AND  THE  RISE  OF  RELIGIOUS 

AND  SCIENTIFIC  INQUIRY 


CHAPTER  X  .  J 

THE  REVIVAL  OF  LEARNING 


The  period  of  change.    The  thirteenth  century  has  often  been 
called  the  wonderful  century  of  the  mediaeval  world.    It  was  won-  £!![__^ 
derful  largely  in  that  the  forces  struggling  against  mediaevaUsm  to  "^ 
evolve  the  modem  spirit  here  first  find  clear  expression.    It  was  a  ^ 
century  of  rapid  and  unmistakable  progress  in  almost  every  line.    X 
By  its  close  great  changes  were  under  way  which  were  destined    ^ 
ultimately  to  shake  off  the  incubus  of  mediaevaUsm  and  to  trans-    ^ 
form  Europe.     In  many  respects,  though,  the  fourteenth  was  a     w. 
still  more  wonderful  century.  i*. 

The  evolution  of  the  universities  which  we  have  Just  traced 
was  one  of  the  most  important  of  these  thirteenth-century  mani- 
festations. Lacking  in  intellectual  material,  but  impelled  by  the 
new  impulses  beginning  to  work  in  the  world,  the  scholars  of  the  ^ 
time  went  earnestly  to  work,  by  speculative  methods,  to  organize  ^ 
the  dogmatic  theolog>"  of  the  Church  into  a  system  of  thinking.  ^  y 
The  result  was  Scholasticism.  From  one  point  of  view  the  result  v<x 
was  barren;  from  another  it  was  full  of  promise  for  the  future."^ 
Though  the  workers  lacked  materials,  were  overshadowed  by  the  >r-^ 
mediaeval  spirit  of  authority,  and  kept  their  efforts  clearly  within 
limits  approved  by  the  Church,  the  "heroic  industry"  and  the't 
"intense  application"  displayed  in  effecting  the  organization, 
and  the  logical  subtlety  developed  in  discussing  the  results,  prom-/ 
ised  much  for  the  future.  The  rise  of  university  instruction,  and 
the  work  of  the  Scholastics  in  organizing  the  knowledge  of  the 
time,  were  both  a  resultant  of  new  influences  already  at  work  and 
a  prediction  of  larger  consequences  to  follow.  In  a  later  age,  and 
with  men  more  emancipated  from  church  control,  the  same  spirit 
was  destined  to  burst  forth  in  an  effort  to  discover  and  recon- 
struct the  historic  past. 

During  the  thirteenth  century,  too,  the  new  Estate,  which  had 
come  into  existence  alongside'  of  the  clergy  and  the  nobiUty,  began 
to  assume  large  importance.  The  arts-and- crafts  guilds  were  at- 
taining a  large  development,  and  out  of  this  new  burgher  class  the 
great  general  pubHc  of  modem  times  has  in  time  evolved.  Trade 
and  industry  were  increasing  in  all  lands,  and  merchants  and  suc- 
cessful artisans  were  becoming  influential  through  their  newly 


I30      A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


m 


obtained  wealth  and  rights.  vXhe  erection  of  stately  churgjies  and 
town  halls,  often  beautifully  carved  and  highly  ornamented,  was 
taking  places    Great  cathedrals,  those  "symphonies  in  stone,"  of 
which  Notre  Dame  is  a  good  example,  were  rising  or  being  further 
expanded  and  decorated  at  many  places  in  western  Europe. 
The  new  spirit  of  nationality.     The  new  spirit  now  moving  in 
'^     western  Europe  also  found  expression  in  the  evolution  of  the 
^^     modem  European  States,  based  on  the  new  national  feeling. 
CN^^^  New  national  languages  also  were  coming  into  being,  and  the 
"*^       national  epics  of  the  people  —  the  Gid,  the  Arthurian  Legends, 
the  Chansons,  and  the  Nihelungen  LieS — were  reduced  to  writ- 
ing.    With  the  introduction  from  the  East,  toward  the  close  of 
the  thirteenth  century,  of  the  process  of  making  paper  for  writ- 
ing, and  with  the  increase  of  books  in  the  vernacular,  the  English, 
French,  Spanish,  Italian,  and  German  languages  rapidly  took 
shape.     Their  development  was  expressive  of  the  new  spirit  in 
western  Europe,  as  also  was  the  fact  that  Dante  (1264-1321), 
^_^      "the  first  literary  layman  since  Boethius"  (d.  524),  wrote  his 
A  >^-i  great  poem,  The  Divine  Comedy,  in  his  native  Italian  instead  of  in 
*^^'^the  Latin  which  he  knew  so  well  —  an  evidence  of  independence 
;J^^  i^tt)f  large  future  import.     New  native  literatures  were  springing 
f  k  forth  all  over  Europe.     Beginning  with  the  troubadours  in  south- 
em  France  (p.  99),  and  taken  up  by  the  trouveres  in  northem 
France  and  by  the  minnesingers  in  German  lands,  the  new  poetry 
^  of  nature  and  love  and  joy  of  living  had  spread  ever3rwhere.    A 
new  race  of  men  was  beginning  to  "sing  songs  as  blithesome  and 
gay  as  the  birds"  and  to  express  in  these  songs  the  Joys  of  the 
world  here  below. 

Transformation  of  the  mediaeval  man.  The  fourteenth  cen- 
tury was  a  period  of  still  more  rapid  change  and  transformation. 
New  objects  of  interest  were  coming  to  the  front,  and  new  stand- 
ards of  judgment  were  being  applied.  National  spirit  and  a  na- 
tional patriotism  were  finding  expression,  f  The  mediaeval  man, 
with  his  feeling  of  personal  insignificance,  lack  of  self-confidence, 
"no  sense  of  the  past  behind  him,  and  no  conception  of  the  possi- 
bilities of  the  future  before  him,"  was  rapidly  giving  way  to  the 
man  possessed  of  the  modem  spirit  —  the  man  of  self-confidence, 
conscious  of  his  powers,  enjoying  life,  feeling  his  connection  with 
the  historic  past,  and  realizing  the  potentiaHties  of  accomplish- 
ment in  the  world  here  below^  It  was  the  great  work  of  the  period 
of  transition,  and  especially  of  the  thirteenth  and  fourteenth  cen- 


THE  REVIVAL  OF  LEARNING 


131 


tunes,  to  efifect  this  change,  *'  to  awaken  in  man  a  consciousness  of 
his  powers,  to  give  him  confidence  in  himself,  to  show  him  the 
beauty  of  the  world  and  the  joy  of  life,  and  to  make  him  feel  his 
living  connection  with  the  past  and  the  greatness  of  the. future  he 
might  create."  As  soon  as  men  began  clearly  to  experience  such 
feelings,  they  began  to  inquire,  and  inquiry  led  to  the  realization 
that  there  had  been  a  great  historic  past  of  which  they  knew  but 
little,  and  of  which  they  wanted  to  know  muchN  When  this  point 
had  been  reached,  western  Europe  was  ready  for  a  revival  of 
learning. 

The  beginnings  in  Italy.  (  This  revival  began  in  Italy.  The 
ItaHans  had  preserved  moreW  the  old  Roman  culture  than  had 
any  other  people,  and  had  been  the  first  to  develop  a  new  political 
and  social  order  and  revive  the  refinements  of  life  after  the  deluge 
of  barbarism  which  had  engulfed  Europe.^  [They,  too,  had  been 
the  first  to  feel  the  inadequacy  of  medical  learning  to  satisfy 
the  intellectual  unrest  of  men  conscious  of  new  standards  of  life!) 
LThis  gave  them  at  least  a  century  of  advance  over  the  nations 
of  northern  Europe.)  (The  old  Roman  life  also  was  nearer  to 
them,  and  meant  more,  so  that  a  movement  for  a  revival  of  inter- 
est in  it  attracted  to  it  the  finest  young  minds  of  central  and  north- 
em  Italy  and  inspired  in  them  something  closely  akin  to  patriotic 
fervor)  They  felt  themselves  the  direct  heirs  of  the  political  and 
intellectual  eminence  of  Imperial  Rome, 
and  they  began  the  work  of  restoring 
to  themselves  and  of  trying  to  under- 
stand their  inheritance/) 

In  Petrarch  (1304-74)  we  have  the 
beginnings  of  the  movement.  He  has 
been  called  "the  first  modem  scholar 
and  man  of  letters."  Repudiating  the 
other-worldliness  ideal  and  the  scho- 
lastic learning  of  his  time,  possessed 
of  a  deep  love  for  beauty  in  nature  and 
art,  a  delight  in  travel,  a  desire  for 
worldly  fame,  a  strong  historical  sense, 
and  the  self-confidence  to  plan  a  great 
constructive  work,  he  began  the  task  of 
unearthing  the  monastic  treasures  to 

ascertain  what  the  past  had  been  and  known  and  done.  At 
twenty-nine  he  made  his  first  great  discovery,  at  Liege,  in  the 


Fig.  26.  Petrarch 
(1304-74) 

'The  Morning  Star  of  the 
Renaissance" 


132        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

form  of  two  previously  unknown  orations  of  Cicero.  Twelve 
years  later,  at  Verona,  he  found  half  of  one  of  the  letters  of 
Cicero  which  had  been  lost  for  ages.  All  his  life  he  collected 
and  copied  manuscripts.  His  letter  to  a  friend  telling  him  of  his 
difficulty  in  getting  a  work  of  Cicero  copied,  and  his  joy  in  doing 

the  work  himself  (R.  125),  is  typical  of 
his  labors. 

Through  Boccaccio,  whom  he  first  met 
in  1350,  Petrarch's  work  was  made  known 
in  Florence,  then  the  wealthiest  and  most 
artistic  and  literary  city  in  the  world, 
and  there  the  new  knowledge  and  method 
were  warmly  received.  Boccaccio  equaled 
Petrarch  in  his  passion  for  the  ancient 
writers,  hunting  for  them  wherever  he 
thought  they  might  be  found.  One  of 
his  pupils  has  left  us  a  melancholy  picture 
of  the  library  at  Monte  Cassino,  as  Boc- 

^°"  (1313-75)^^^^°        ^^^^^^  ^^^^  ^^  ^^  ^^^  ^^^  ^^  ^"^  ^^^* 
"TheFatherofltalianProse"    C^'  I26).      He  wrote  a  book  of  popular 

tales  and  romances,  filled  with  the  mod- 
em spirit,  which  made  him  the  father  of  Italian  prose  as  Dante 
was  of  Italian  poetry;  prepared  the  first  dictionaries  of  classical 
geography  and  Greek  mythology;  and  was  the  first  western 
scholar  to  learn  Greek. 

"In  the  dim  light  of  learning's  dawn  they  stand, 
Flushed  with  the  first  glimpses  of  a  long-lost  land." 

A  century  of  recovery  and  reconstruction.  The  work  done  by 
these  two  friends  in  discovering  and  editing  was  taken  up  by 
others,  and  during  the  century  (1333-1433)  dating  from  the  first 
great  "find"  of  Petrarch  the  principal  additions  to  Latin  litera- 
ture were  made.  The  monasteries  and  castles  of  Europe  were 
ransacked  in  the  hope  of  discovering  something  new,  or  more  ac- 
curate copies  of  previously  known  books.  At  monasteries  and 
churches  as  widely  separated  as  Monte  Cassino,  near  Naples; 
Lodi,  near  Milan;  Milan,  itself;  and  Vercelli,  in  Italy:  Saint  Gall 
and  other  monasteries,  in  Switzerland:  Paris;  Cluny,  near  the 
present  city  of  Macon;  Langres,  near  the  source  of  the  Mame; 
and  monasteries  in  the  Vosges  Mountains,  in  France:  Corvey,  in 
Westphalia;  and  Hersfeld,  Cologne,  and  Mainz  in  Germany  — 
important  finds  were  made.     Thus  widely  had  the  old  Latin 


THE  REVIVAL  OF  LEARNING  133 

authors  been  scattered,  copied,  and  forgotten.  In  a  letter  to  a 
friend  (R.  127  a)  the  enthusiast,  Poggio  Bracciolini,  tells  of  finding 
(1416)  the  long-lost  Institutes  of  Oratory  of  Quintilian,  at  Saint 
Gall,  and  of  copying  it  for  posterity.  This,  and  the  reply  of  his 
friend  (R.  127  b),  reveal  something  of  the  spirit  and  the  emotions 
of  those  engaged  in  the  recovery  of  Latin  literature  and  the  re- 
construction of  Roman  history. 

The  finds,  though,  while  important,  were  after  all  of  less  value 
than  the  spirit  which  directed  the  search,  or  the  careful  work 
which  was  done  in  collecting,  comparing,  questioning,  inferring, 
criticizing,  and  editing  corrected  texts,  and  reconstructing  old 
Roman  life  and  history./  We  have  in  this  new  work  a  complete 
break  with  scholastic  methods,  and  we  see  in  it  the  awakening  of 
the  modern  scientific  spiritT^  It  was  this  same  critical,  construc- 
tive spirit  which,  when  applied  later  to  Christian  practices, 
brought  on  the  Reformatio]]^  when  applied  to  the  problems  of  the 
universe,  revealed  to  men  the  wonderful  world  of  science)  and 
when  applied  to  problems  of  government,  led  to  the  questioning 
of  the  theory  of  the  divine  right  of  kings,  and  to  the  evolution  of 
democracyr)(We  have  here  a  modem  spirit,  a  craving  for  truth 
for  its  own  sake,  an  awakening  of  the  historical  sense,  and  an  ap- 
preciation of  beauty  in  literature  and  nature  which  was  soon  to  be 
followed  by  an  appreciation  of  beauty  in  ar^ 

The  revival  of  Greek  in  the  West.  With  the  new  intei-est  in 
Latin  literature  it  was  but  natural  that  a  revival  of  the  study  of 
Greek  should  follow.  While  a  knowledge  of  Greek  had  not  abso- 
lutely died  out  in  the  West  during  the  Middle  Ages,  there  were 
very  few  scholgirs  who  knew  anything  about  it,  and  none  who 
could  read  it.  Cit  was  natural,  too,  that  the  revival  of  it  should 
come  first  in  Italy?) 

Near  the  end  of  the  fourteenth  century  it  became  known  in 
Florence  that  Manuel  Chrysoloras  (c.  13 50-14 15),  a  Byzantine  of 
noble  birth,  a  teacher  of  rhetoric  and  philosophy  at  Constanti- 
nople, and  the  most  accomplished  Greek  scholar  of  his  age,  had 
arrived  in  Venice  as  an  envoy  from  the  Eastern  Emperor.  Flor- 
entine scholars  visited  him,  and  on  his  return  accompanied  him  to 
Constantinople  to  learn  Greek.  In  1396  Chrysoloras  was  invited 
by  Florence  to  accept  an  appointment,  in  the  university  there,  to 
the  first  chair  of  Greek  letters  m  the  West,  and  accepted.")  From 
(^1396  to  i4oo)he  taught  Greek  in  the  rich  and  stately  city'of  Flor- 
ence, at  that  time  the  intellectual  and  artistic  center  of  Christen- 


134       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

dom.      From  his  visit  dates  the  enthusiasm  for  the  study  of 
Greek  in  the  West. 

Other  Greek  scholars  arrive  in  Italy.  Chrysoloras  returned  to 
Constantinople  for  a  time,  in  1403,  and  Guarina  of  Verona,  who 
had  been  one  of  his  pupils,  accompanied  him  and  spent  five  years 
there  as  a  member  of  his  household.  When  he  returned  to  Italy 
he  brought  with  him  about  fifty  manuscripts,  and  before  his  death 
he  had  translated  a  number  of  them  into  Latin.\  He  also  pre- 
pared a  Greek  grammar  which  superseded  that'T)f  Chrysoloras. 
/in  141 2  he  was  elected  to  the  chair  at  Florence  formerly  held  by 
Chrysoloras,  and  later  he  established  an  important  school  at 
Ferrara,  based  largely  on  instruction  in  the  Latin  and  Greek 
classics,  which  will  be  referred  to  again  in  the  next  chapter. 
[  A  number  of  other  learned  Greeks  had  reached  Italy  prior  to 
the  fall  of  Constantinople  (1453)  before  the  advancing  Turks^ 
and  after  its  fall  many  more  sought  there  a  new  home^  Many  of 
these  found,  on  landing,  that  their  knowledge  of  Greek  and  the 
possession  of  a  few  Greek  books  was  an  open  sesame  to  the  learned 
circles  of  Italy. 

Enthusiasm  for  the  new  movement ;  libraries  and  academies 
founded.  The  enthusiasm  for  the  recovery  and  restoration 
of  ancient  literature  and  history  which  this  work  awakened 
among  the  younger  scholars  of  Italy  can  be  imagined.  (^While 
most  'of  the  professors  in  the  universities  and  most  of  the 
church  officials  at  first  had  nothing  to  do  with  the  new  move- 
ment, being  wedded  to  scholastic  methods  of  thinking,  the  lead- 
ers of  the  new  learning  drew  about  them  many  of  the  brightest 
and  most  energetic  of  the  young  men  who  came  to  those  univer- 
sities which  were  hospitable  to  the  new  movement^  Greek 
scholars  in  the  university  towns  were  followed  by  admiring  bands 
of  younger  students^  who  soon  took  up  the  work  and  superseded 
their  master^  (Academies,  named  after  the  one  conducted  by 
Plato  in  the  groves  near  Athens,  whose  purpose  was  to  promote 
literary  studies,  were  founded  in  all  the  important  Itahan  cities 
(R.  129) .  The  members  usually  Latinized  their  names,  and  cele- 
brated the  ancient  festivals.  It  was  the  curious  and  enthusiastic 
Italians  who,  more  than  the  Greek  scholars  who  taught  them  the 
language,  opened  up  the  literature  and  history  of  Athens  to  the 
comprehension  of  the  western  world.) 

(_  The  financial  support  of  the  movement  came  from  the  wealthy 
merchant  princes,  reigning  dukes,  and  a  few  church  authorities, 


THE  REVIVAL  OF  LEARNING  135 

who  assisted  scholars  and  spent  money  most  liberally  in  collecting 
manuscripts  and  accumulating  books.  Cosimo  de'  Medici 
(1389- 1464),  a  banker  and  ruler  of  Florence,  spent  great  sums  in 
collecting  and  copying  manuscripts.J)  Vespasiano,  a  fifteenth- 
century  bookseller  of  Florence,  has  left  us  an  interesting  picture 
of  the  work  of  Cosimo  in  founding  (1444)  the  great  Medicean 


Fig.  28.  Bookcase  and  Desk  in  the  Medicean  Library 

AT  Florence 

(Drawn  from  a  photograph) 

This  library  was  founded  in  1444.  It  contains  to-day  about  10,000 
Greek  and  Latin  manuscripts,  many  of  them  very  rare,  and  of  a 
few  the  only  copies  known.  The  building  was  designed  by  Michael 
Angelo,  and  its  construction  was  begun  in  1525.  The  bookcases  are 
of  about  this  date.  It  shows  the  early  method  of  chaining  books  to 
the  shelves,  and  cataloguing  the  volumes  on  the  end  of  each  stack. 

library  at  Florence  (R.  130)  and  of  the  difficulties  of  book  collect- 
ing in  the  days  before  the  invention  of  printing.  Under  Cosimo's 
grandson,  Lorenzo  the  Magnificent,  who  died  in  1492,  two  expe- 
ditions were  sent  to  Greece  to  obtain  manuscripts  for  the  Floren- 
tine library.    Vespasiano  also  describes  for  us  the  books  collected 


136 


A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


(c.  1475-80)  for  the  great  ducal  library  at  Urbiro  (R.  131),  the 
greatest  library  in  the  Christian  world  at  the  time  of  its  comple- 
tion, and  the  work  of  Pope  Nicholas  V  (1447-1455)  in  laying  the 
foundations  (1450)  for  the  great  Vatican  Library  at  Rome  (R.  132). 
.  The  revival  aided  by  the  invention  of  paper  and  printing.  Very 
fortunately  for  the  spread  of  the  new  learning  an  important 
process  and  a  great  invention  now  came  in  at  a  rnost  opportune 
time/^The  process  was  the  manufacture  of  paper j« the  invention 
that  of  printing.^ 

The  manufacture  of  paper  is  probably  a  Chinese  invention ^ 
early  obtained  by  the  Arabs.  ^Puring  the  Mohammedan  occupa- 
tion of  Spain  paper  mills  were  set  up  there,  and  a  small  supply  of 

their  paper  found  its  way 
across  the  Pyrenees?)  The 
Christians  who  drove  the  Mo- 
hammedans out  lost  the  pro- 
cess, and  it  now  came  back 
once  more  from  the  East.  By 
about  1^12501  the  Greeks  had 
obtained  the  process  from 
P  Mohammedan  sources,  and  in  V- 
'  1276  the  first  paper  mill  was  / 
set  up  in  Italy.  In  1340  "a 
paper  factory  was  established 
at  Padua,  and  soon  thereafter 
other  factories  began  to  make 
paper  at  Florence,  Bologna, 
Milan,  and  Venice,  [in  1320  a 
paper  factory  was  established 
at  Mainz,  in  Germany,  and 
,  in  1390  another  at  Nuremberg^) 
By  1450  paper  was  in  common 
use  and  the  way  was  now  open 
for  one  of  the  world's  greatest 
inventions.) 

[  This  was  the  invention  of 
printing.]  From  the  difficulty 
experienced  in  securing  books 
for  the  great  libraries  at  Florence,  Urbino,  and  Rome,  as  we  have 
seen  (Rs.  130, 131,  132),  and  the  great  cost  of  reproducing  single 
copies  of  books,  we  can  see  that  the  work  of  the  humanists  of 


Fig. 


29.  An  Early  Sixteenth- 
Century  Press 


"The  prynters  haue  founde  a  crafte  to  make 
bokis  by  brasen  letters  sette  in  ordre  by  a 
frame."  An  engraving,  dated  1520.  The 
man  at  the  right  is  setting  type,  and  the 
one  at  the  lever  is  making  an  impression. 
A  number  of  four-page  printed  sheets  are 
seen  on  the  table  at  the  right  of  the  press. 


THE  REVIVAL  OF  LEARNING 


137 


the  fourteenth  and  fifteenth  centuries  in  Italy  probably  would 
have  had  but  little  influence  elsewhere  but  for  the  invfintion 
of  printing.    To  disseminate  a  new  learning  involving  two  great 
literatures  by  copying  books,  one  at  a  time  by  hand,  would  have 
prevented  instruction  in  the  new  subjects  becoming  general  for 
centuries,  and  would  have  materially  retarded  the  progress  of 
the  world.  LThe  discovery  of  the  art  of  printing,  coming  when  it 
did,  scattered  the  new  learning  over  Europe^) 
L  The  enormous  importance  of  this  new  invention  which  could  be 
used  to  print  rapidly  a  thousand  or  more  copies  of  a  book,  all 
exactly  alike  and  free  from  copyist  errors,  can  be  appreciated.  / 
It  tremendously  cheapened  books,  made  the  general  use  of  the 
textbook  method  of  teaching  possible,  and  paved  the  way  for  a 
great  extension  of  schools  and  learning  (R.  134)^  From  now  on 
the  press  became  a  formidable  rival  to  the  pulpit  and  the  ser- 
mon, and  one  of  the  greatest  of  instruments  for  human  progress 
and  individual  liberty.  V  From  this  time  on  educational  jjrogress    -^ 
was  to  be  much  more  rapid  than  it  had  been  in  the  past^  (JFrom  "^ 
an  educational  point  of  view  the  invention  of  printing  might 
almost  be  taken  as  marking  the  close  of  the  mediaeval  and  the      . 
beginning  of  modem  times. ')  >.  j 

\  {^  vRise  of  geographical  discovery.    The  new  influences  awakened 


by  the  Revival  of  Learning  found  expression  in  other  directions. 


(Mtnown 
Uncertain, 
(pcsaiittp  known)        ' 
Sxfilored  Heyion  I 


^ 


Fig.  30.  The  World  as  known  to  Christian  Europe  bepore  Columbus 

One  of  these  was  geographical  discovery,  itself  an  outgrowth  of 
that  series  of  movements  known  as  the  Crusades,  with  the  accom- 
panying revival  of  trade  and  commerce.    These  led  to  travel,  ex- 


138        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

ploration,  and  discovery.  By  the  latter  part  of  the  thirteenth 
century  the  most  extensive  travel  which  had  taken  place  since  the 
days  of  ancient  Rome  had  begun,  and  in  the  next  two  and  a  half 
centuries  a  great  expansion  of  the  known  world  took  place. 
Marco  Polo  and  Sir  John  Mandeville  made  extended  travels  to 
the  Orient,  and  returning  (Polo  returned,  1295)  described  to  a 
wondering  Europe  the  new  lands  and  peoples  they  had  seen.  The 
Voyages  of  Polo  and  the  Travels  of  Mandeville  were  widely  read. 
By  the  beginning  of  the  fourteenth  century  the  compass  had  been 
perfected,  in  Naples,  and  a  great  era  of  exploration  had  been  be- 
gun. In  1402  venturesome  sailors,  out  beyond  the  ''Pillars  of 
Hercules,"  discovered  the  Canary  Islands;  in  141 9  the  Madeira 
Islands  were  reached;  in  1460  the  Cape  Verde  Islands  were  found; 
and  in  1497  Vasco  da  Gama  rounded  the  southern  tip  of  Africa 
and  discovered  the  long-hoped-for  sea  route  to  India.  Five  years 
later,  sailing  westward  with  the  same  end  in  view,  Columbus  dis- 
covered the  American  continent.  Finally,  in  15 19-21,  Magel- 
lan's ships  circumnavigated  the  globe,  and,  returning  safely  to 
Spain,  proved  that  the  world  was  round,  vjn  1507  Waldensee- 
miiller  published  his  Introduction  to  Geography,  a  book  that  was 
widely  read,  and  one  which  laid  the  foundations  of  this  modem 
study. 

The  effect  of  these  discoveries  in  broadening  the  minds  of  men 
can  be  imagined.  /  The  religious  theories  and  teachings  of  the 
Middle  Ages  as  to  me  world  were  in  large  part  upset.^  New  races 
and  new  peoples  had  been  found,  a  round  earth  instead  of  a  flat 
one  had  been  proved  to  exist,  new  continents  had  been  discovered, 
and  new  worlds  were  now  ready  to  be  opened  up  for  scientific  ex- 
ploration and  colonization. 

\^  About  1500  a  stimulating  time.  The  latter  part  of  the  fifteenth 
century  and  the  earher  part  of  the  sixteenth  was  a  stimulating 
period  in  the  intellectual  development  of  Christian  Europe  The 
Turks  had  closed  in  on  Constantinople  (1453)  and  ended  the 
Eastern  Empire,  and  many  Greek  scholars  had  fled  to  the  West. 
Though  the  Revival  of  Learning  had  culminated  in  Italy,  its  in- 
fluence was  still  strongly  felt  in  such  cities  as  Florence  and  Venice, 
while  in  German  lands  and  in  England  the  reform  movement 
awakened  by  it  was  at  its  height.  Greek  and  Hebrew  were  now 
taught  generally  in  the  northern  universities.  Everywhere  the 
old  scholastic  learning  and  methods  were  being  overturned  by 
the  new  humanism,  and  scholastic  teachers  were  being  displaced 


THE  REVIVAL  OF  LEARNING  139 

from  their  positions  in  the  universities  and  schools.  The  new  hu- 
manistic university  at  Wittenberg/^ounded  in  1502,  was  exerting 
large  influence  among  German  scholars -and  attracting  to  it  the 
brightest  young  minds  in  German  lands.  Erasmus  was  the  great- 
est international  scholar  of  the  age,  though  ably  seconded  by  dis- 
tinguished humanistic  scholars  in  Italy,  France,  England,  the  Low 
Countries,  and  German  lands.  (The  court  schools  of  Italy  (R.  135) 
and  the  municipal  colleges  of  France  (R.  136)  were  marking  out 
new  lines  in  the  education  of  the  select  few^  Colet  was  founding 
his  reformed  grammar  school  (15 10)  at  Saint  Paul's,  in  London 
(R.  138),  the  first  of  a  long  line  of  Enghsh  humanistic  grammar 
schools. )  Leonardo  da  Vinci,  Raphael,  and  Michael  Angelo  were 
adding  new  fame  to  Italy,  and  carrying  the  Renaissance  move-  , 
ment  over  into  that  art  which  the  world  has  ever  since  treasured 
and  admired. 

The  Italian  cities,  particularly  Genoa  and  Venice,  had  become 
rich  from  their  commerce,  as  had  many  cities  in  northern  lands. 
Everywhere  the  cities  were  centers  for  the  new  life  in  western 
Christendom.  England  was  rapidly  changing  from  an  agricul- 
tural to  a  manufacturing  nation.  V^he  serf  was  evolving  into  a 
free  man  all  over  western  Europe.^  Italian  navigators  had  dis- 
covered new  sea  routes  and  lands,  and  robbed  the  ocean  of  its  ter- 
rors. Columbus  had  discovered  a  new  world,  soon  to  be  peopled 
and  to  become  the  home  of  a  new  civilization.  Magellan  had 
shown  that  the  world  was  round  and  poised  iji  space,  instead  of 
flat  and  surrounded  by  a  circumfluent  ocean.^  The  printing-press 
had  been  perfected  and  scattered  over  Europe,  and  was  rapidly 
multiplying  books  and  creating  a  new  desire  to  read  (R.  134). 
The  Church  was  more  tolerant  of  new  ideas  than  it  had  been  in 
the  past,  or  soon  was  to  be  for  centuries  to  come.  All  of  these 
new  influences  and  conditions  combined  to  awaken  thought  as 
had  not  happened  before  since  the  days  of  ancient  Rome.  The 
world  seemed  about  ready  for  rapid  advances  in  many  new  direc- 
tions, and  great  progress  in  learning,  education,  government,  art, 
commerce,  and  invention  seemed  almost  within  grasp.  Un- 
fortimately  the  promise  was  not  to  be  fulfilled,  and  th^  progress 
that  seemed  possible  in  1500  was  soon  lost  amid  the  bitterness 
and  hatreds  engendered  by  a  great  religious  conflict,  then  about 
to  break,  and  which  was  destined  to  leave,  for  centuries  to  come,  a 
legacy  of  intolerance  and  suspicion  in  all  landg.'j 


140       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

1.  In  what  way  was  the  fact  that  Dante  wrote  his  Divine  Comedy  in  Italian 
instead  of  Latin  an  evidence  of  large  independence? 

2.  Was  it  a  good  thing  for  peace  and  civilization  that  the  modern  languages 
arose,  instead  of  all  speaking  and  writing  Latin?     Why? 

3.  Of  what  value  to  one  is  a  "sense  of  the  past  behind  him,  and  a  conception 
of  the  possibilities  of  the  future  before  him,"  by  way  of  giving  perspective 
and  self-confidence?    Do  we  have  many  mediaeval-type  people  to-day? 

4.  Show  how  the  work  of  Petrarch  required  a  man  with  a  strong  historic 
sense. 

5.  Show  the  awakening  of  the  modern  scientific  spirit  in  the  critical  and 
reconstructive  work  of  the  scholars  of  the  Revival. 

6.  Contrast  the  modern  and  the  mediaeval  spirit  as  related  to  learning. 

7.  Suppose  that  we  should  unexpectedly  unearth  in  Mexico  a  vast  literature 
of  a  very  learned  and  scholarly  people  who  once  inhabited  the  United 
States,  and  should  discover  a  key  by  which  to  read  it.  Would  the 
interest  awakened  be  comparable  with  that  awakened  by  the  revival  of 
Greek  in  Italy?    Why? 

8.  What  does  the  fact  that  no  copy  of  Quintilian's  Institutes,  a  very  famous 
Roman  book,  was  known  in  Europe  before  1416  indicate  as  to  the  de- 
struction of  books  during  the  early  Christian  period? 

9.  What  does  the  fact  that  the  Christians  knew  little  about  Greek  literature 
or  scholarship  for  centuries,  and  that  the  awakening  was  in  large  part 
brought  about  by  the  pressure  of  the  Turks  on  the  Eastern  Empire, 
indicate  as  to  intercourse  among  Mediterranean  peoples  during  the 
Middle  Ages? 

10.  How  do  you  explain  the  fact  that  the  recovery  of  the  ancient  learning 
was  very  largely  the  work  of  young  men,  and  that  older  professors  in 
the  universities  frequently  held  aloof  from  any  connection  with  the 
movement? 

11.  Compare  the  financial  support  of  the  Revival  in  Italy  with  the  support 
of  universities  and  of  scientific  undertakings  in  America  during  recent 
times. 

12.  Explain  the  long-delayed  interest  in  the  Revival  in  the  northern  countries. 

13.  Trace  the  larger  steps  in  the  transference  of  Greek  literature  and  learn- 
ing from  Athens,  in  the  fifth  century  B.C.,  to  its  arrival  at  Harvard,  in 
Massachusetts,  in  1636. 

14.  What  was  the  importance  of  the  rediscovery  of  Hebrew? 

'^  15.  Show  how  the  invention  of  printing  was  a  revolutionary  force  of  the 

first  magnitude. 
^    16.  Why  should  a  Ucense  from  the  Church  have  been  necessary  to  print  a 

book?     Have  we  any  remaining  vestiges  of  this  church  control  over 

books? 
17.  Do  you  see  any  special  reason  why  Venice  should  have  become  the  early 
^         center  of  the  book  trade? 

1^  18.  Show  how  the  printing-press  became  "a  formidable  rival  to  the  pulpit 
P  and  the^ermon,  and  one  of  the  greatest  instruments  for.  human  progress 
^  and  liberty." 

19.  One  writer  has  characterized  the  Revival  of  Learning  as  the  beginnings 
V        of  the  emergence  of  the  individual  from  institutional  control,  and  the 

substitution  of  the  humanities  for  the  divinities  as  the  basis  of  education. 

Is  this  a  good  characterization  of  a  phase  of  the  movement? 


141 


^7  SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  selections  are  repro- 
duced: 

125.  Petrarch:  On  copying  a  Work  of  Cicero. 

126.  Benvenuto:  Boccaccio's  Visit  to  the  Library  at  Monte  Cassino. 

127.  Symonds:  Finding  of  Quintilian's  Institutes  at  Saint  Gall. 

(a)  Letter  of  Poggio  Bracciolini  on  the  "Find." 
{h)  Reply  of  Lionardo  Bruni. 

128.  MS.:  Reproducing  Books  before  the  Days  of  Printing. 

129.  Symonds:  Italian  Societies  for  studying  the  Classics. 

130.  Vespasiano:  Founding  of  the  Medicean  Library  at  Florence. 

131.  Vespasiano:  Founding  of  the  Ducal  Library  at  Urbino. 

132.  Vespasiano:  Founding  of  the  Vatican  Library  at  Rome. 

133.  Green:  The  New  Learning  at  Oxford. 

134.  Green:  The  New  Taste  for  Books. 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

*Adams,  G.  B.     Civilizaiion  during  the  Middle  Ages. 

Blades,  William.     William  Caxton. 

Duff,  E.  G.     Early  Printed  Books. 
*Field,  Lilian  F.    Introduction  to  the  Study  of  the  Renaissance. 
*Howells,  W.  D.     Venetian  Days  (Venetian  commerce). 
*Keane,  John.     The  Evolution  of  Geography. 

La  Croix,  Paul.     The  Arts  in  the  Middle  Ages  and  at  the  Period  of  the 
Renaissance. 
*Loomis,  Louise.     MedicBval  Hellenism. 

Oliphant,  Mrs.     Makers  of  Venice. 
*Robinson,  J.  H.,  and  Rolfe,  H.  W.    Petrarch,  the  First  Modern  Scholar  and 
Man  of  Letters. 

Sandys,  J.  E.    History  of  Classical  Scholarship,  vol.  n. 
*Sandys,  J.  E.     Harvard  Lectures  on  the  Revival  of  Learning. 

Scaife,  W.  B.    Florentine  Life  during  the  Renaissance. 

Sedgwick,  H.  D.     Italy  in  the  Thirteenth  Century. 
*Symonds,  J.  A.    The  Renaissance  in  Italy;  vol.  11,  The  Revival  of  Learning. 

Thorndike,  Lynn.    History  of  MeduBval  Europe. 
*Walsh,  Jas.  J.     The  Thirteenth,  Greatest  of  Centuries. 

Whitcomb,  M.    Source  Book  of  the  Italian  Renaissance. 


^„.-y^  ^r- 


^fiy^ 


CHAPTER  XI 

EDUCATIONAL  RESULTS  OF  THE  REVIVAL  OF 
LEARNING 

Significance  of  the  Revival  of  Learning.  The  important  and  out- 
standing educational  result  of  the  revival  of  ancient  learning  by 
Italian  scholars  was  that  it  laid  a  basis  for  a  new  type  of  education 
below  that  of  the  university,  destined  in  time  to  be  much  more 
widely  opened  to  promising  youths  than  the  old  cathedral  and 
monastic  schools  had  been.  This  new  education,  based  on  the 
great  intellectual  inheritance  recovered  from  the  ancient  world  by 
a  relatively  small  number  of  Italian  scholars,  dominated  the  sec- 
ondary-school training  of  the  middle  and  higher  classes  of  society 
for  the  next  four  hundred  years,  lit  clearly  began  by  1450,  it 
clearly  controlled  secondary  education  until  at  least  after  1850.  \ 
Out  of  the  efforts  of  Italian  scholars  to  resurrect,  reconstruct,  un-^ 
derstand,  and  utilize  in  education  the  fruits  of  their  legacy  from 
the  ancient  Greek  and  Roman  world,  arose  modem  secondary 
education,  as  contrasted  with  mediaeval  church  education. 

(jklediaeval  educationi',  after  all,  was  narrowly  technical.  It 
prepared  for  but  one  profession,  and  one  type  of  service.  There 
was  little  that  was  liberal,  cultural,  or  humanitarian  about  it.  It 
/prepared  for  the  world  to  come],  not  for  the  world  men  live  in  here. 
The  new  education  developed  in  Italy  aimed  to  prepare  directly 
for  life  in  the  world  here,  and  for  useful  and  enjoyable  life  at  that. 
Combining  with  the  new  humanistic  (cultural)  studies  the  best 
ideals  and  practices  of  the  old  chivalric  education  —  physical 
training,  manners  and  courtesy,  reverence  —  the  Italian  pioneers 
devised  a  scheme  of  education,  below  that  of  the  universities, 
which  they  claimed  prepared  youths  not  only  for  an  intellectual 
appreciation  of  the  great  and  wonderful  past  of  which  they  were 
descendants,  but  also  for  intelligent  service  in  the  two  great  non- 
church  occupations  of  Italy  in  the  fifteenth  century  — ^  public 
service  for  the  City-State,  and  commerce  and  a  business  lifej 
This  new  type  of  education  spread  to  other  lands,  and  a  new 
type  of  secondary-school  training,  actuated  by  a  new  and  a 
modem  purpose,  thus  came  out  of  the  revival  of  learning  in  Italy. 
New  schools  created.  The  "finds"  began  with  Petrarch's  dis- 
covery of  two  orations  of  Cicero,  in  1333,  and  by  the  time  "the 


EDUCATIONAL  RESULTS  OF  THE  REVIVAL    143 

century  of  finds"  (1333-1433)  was  drawing  to  a  dose  the  mate- 
rials  for  a  new  type  of  secondary  education  had  been  accumulated. 

(  Not  only  was  the  old  literature  discovered  and  edited,  but  the 
finding  of  a  complete  copy  of  Quintilian's  Institutes  of  Oratory  at 
Saint  Gall  (R.  127),  in  1416,  gave  a  detailed  explanation  of  the  old 
Roman  theory  of  education  at  its  bestN  A  number  of  "court 
schools"  now  arose  in  the  different  citieS^  to  which  children  from 
the  nobility  and  the  banking  and  merchant  classes  were  sent  to 
enjoy  the  advantages  they  offered  over  the  older  types  of  rehgious 
schools. 

Two  of  the  most  famous  teachers  in  these  court  schools  were 
Vittorino  da  Feltre,  who  conducted  a  famous  school  at  Mantua 
from  1423  to  1446,  and  Guarino  da  Verona,  who  conducted  an- 
other almost  equally  famous  school  at  Ferrara  from  1429  to  1460. 

V  Taking  boys  at  nine  or  ten  and  retaining  them  until  twenty  or 
twenty-one^  their  schools  were  much  like  the  best  private  board- 
ing-schools of  England  and  America  to-day.  (^Drawing  to  them  a 
selected  class  of  students;  emphasizing  physical  activities,  man- 
ners, and  morals;  employing  good  teaching  processes;  and  provid- 
ing the  best  instruction  the  world  had  up  to  that  time  known  — 
the  influence  of  these  court  schools  was  indeed  large'^S  Many  of 
the  most  distinguished  leaders  in  Church  and  State  and  some  of 
the  best  scholars  of  the  time  were  trained  in  them.     By  better 

f  methods  they  covered,  in  shorter  time,  as  much  or  more  than  was 
provided  in  the  Arts  course  of  the  universities,  and  so  became  ri- 
vals of  them.  The  ultimate  result  was  that  the  Arts  courses  in  the 
universities  Vere  advanced  to  a  much  higher  plane. 

The  humanistic  course  of  study.  (jThe  new  instruction  was 
based  on  the  study  of  Greek,  and  Latin,  combined  with  the  courtly 
ideal  and  with  some  of  the  physical  activities  of  the  old  chivalric 
education.  \  Latin  was  begun  with  the  first  year  in  school,  and  the 
regular  Roman  emphasis  was  placed  on  articulation  and  proper 
accent.  Alter  some  facility  in  the  language  had  been  gained,  easy 
readings,  selected  from  the  greatest  Roman  writers,  were  at- 
tempted. As  progress  was  made  in  reading  an3^  writing  and 
speaking  Latin  as  a  living  language,  Cicero  and  Quintilian  among 
prose  writers,  and  Vergil,  Lucan,  Horace^  Seneca,  and  Claudian 
among  the  poets,  were  read  and  studied.  vHistory  was  introduced 
in  these  schools  for  the  first  time  and  as  a  new  subject  of  stud^ 
though  the  history  was  the  history  of  Greece. and  Rome  and  was 
drawn  from  the  authors  studied.     Livy  and  Plutarch  were  the 


144       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

chief  historical  writers  used.  Nothing  that  happened  after  the 
fall  of  Rome  was  deemed  as  of  importance>)  Much  emphasis  was 
placed  on  manners,  morality,  and  reverence,  with  Livy  and  Plu- 
tarch again  as  the  great  guides  to  conduct.  Throughout  all  this 
the  use  of  Latin  as  a  living  language  was  insisted  upon ;  declama- 
tion became  a  fine  art;  and  the  ability  to  read,  speak,  and  com- 
pose in  Latin  was  the  test.  Cicero,  in  particular,  because  of  the 
exquisite  quahty  of  his  Latin  style,  became  the  great  prose  model. 
Quintilian  was  the  supreme  authority  on  the  purpose  and  method 
of  teaching  (R.  25).  Greek  also  was  begun  later,  though  studied 
much  less  extensively  and  thoroughly.  The  Greek  grammar  of 
Theodorus  Gaza  was  studied,  followed  by  the  reading  of  Xeno- 
phon,  Isocrates,  Plutarch,  and  some  of  Homer  and  Hesiod. 
\  This  thorough  drill  in  ancient  history  and  literature  was  given 
along  with  careful  attention  to  manners  and  moral  training,  and 
each  pupil's  health  was  watchfully  supervised  —  an  absolutely 
new  thought  in  the  Christian  world.  Such  physical  sports  and 
games  as  fencing,  wrestHng,  playing  ball,  football,  running,  leap- 
ing, and  dancing  were  also  given  special  emphasis.  (.Competitive 
games  between  different  schools  were  held,  much  as  in  modern 
times,  j  The  result  was  an  all-round  physical,  mental,  and  moral 
training,  vastly  superior  to  anything  previously  offered  by  the 
cathedral  and  other  church  schools,  and  which  at  once  established 
a  new  type  which  was  widely  copied/) 

Humanism  in  France.  From  Italy  the  new  humanism  was 
carried  to  France,  along  with  the  retreating  armies  that  had  occu- 
pied Naples,  Florence,  and  Milan,  and  when  Francis  I  came  to  the 
French  throne,  in  151 5,  the  new  learning  found  in  him  a  willing 
patron. 

A  royal  press  was  set  up  in  Paris,  in  1526,  to  promote  the  in- 
troduction of  the  new  leaming^  Libraries  were  built  up,  as  in 
Italy.  Humanist  scholars  were  made  secretaries  and  ambas- 
sadors. /The  College  de France  was  established  at  Paris,  by  direc- 
tion of  the  King,  with  chairs  in  Latin,  Greek,  Hebrew,  and  mathe- 
matics. \  To  Hebrew  the  Italians  had  given  almost  no  attention, 
but  in  f'rance,  and  particularly  in  Germany,  Hebrew  became  an 
important  study.  The  development  of  schools  in  northern  France 
was  hindered  by  the  dissensions  following  the  religious  revolts  of 
Luther  and  Calvin,  but  in  southern  France  many  of  the  cities 
founded  municipal  colleges,  much  like  thie  court  schools  of  north- 
em  It^  in  type.     The  work  of  the  city  of  Bordeaux  in  reorgan- 


EDUCATIONAL  RESULTS  OF  THE  REVIVAL    145 

izing  its  town  school  along  the  new  lines  was  typical  of  the  work 
of  other  southern  cities.  Mjrood  teachers,  liberal  instruction,  and 
a  broad-minded  atti-  .  .  ,^.  . 
tude  on  the  part  of  Li^'^ 
the  governing  author- 
ities made  this  school, 
known  as  the  College 
de  Guyenne,  notable 
not  only  for  human- 
istic instruction,  but 
for  intelligent  public 
education  during  tEe 
second  half  of  the  six- 
teenth century.  The 
picture  of  this  college 
(school)  left  us  by  its 
greatest     principal, 


Fig.  31.  College  de  France 

Founded  at  Paris,  in  1530,  by  King  Frands  I.  for 
instruction  in  the  new  humanistic  learning 


Elie  Vinet  (R.  136),  gives  an  interesting  description  of  its  work. 

Humanism  in  Germany.  The  French  language  and  life  was 
closely  related  to  that  of  northern  Italy,  and  French  religious 
thought  had  always  been  so  closely  in  touch  with  that  of  Rome 
that  something  of  the  Italian  feeling  for  the  old  Roman  culture 
and  institutions  was  felt  by  the  humanists  of  Franc^  In  Ger- 
many and  England  no  such  feeling  existed,  and  in  these~countries 
any  effort  to  discredit  the  rising  native  languages  was  much  more 
likely  to  be  regarded  as  mere  pedantryN  In  both  these  countries, 
though,  Latin  was  still  the  language  of  the  Church,  of  the  univer- 
sities, of  all  learned  writing,  and  the  means  of  international  inter- 
course, and  after  the  new  humanism  had  once  obtained  a  foothold 
it  was  welcomed  by  scholars  as  a  great  addition  to  existing  knowl- 
edge. 

The  enthusiasm  of  the  humanists  for  the  new  learning  led  them 
to  urge  the  establishment  of!numanistic  secondary  schools  in  the 
German  cities.  \  As  in  Italy,  tlie  commercial  cities  were  the  first 
to  provide  schools  of  the  new  type.  In  1526  the  commercial  city 
of  Nuremberg,  in  southern  Germany,  opened  one  of  the  first  of 
the  new  city  humanistic  secondary  schools,  Melanchthon  being 
present  and  giving  the  dedicatory  address.  A  number  of  similar 
schools  were  founded  about  this  time  in  various  German  cities 
— Ilfeld,  Frankfort,  Strassburg,  Hamburg,  Bremen,  Dantzig 
— among  the  number.    Many  of  these  failed,  as  did  the  one  at 


146       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


Nuremberg,  to  meet  the  needs  of  the  people  in  essentially  com- 
mercial cities.  Whatever  might  have  been  true  in  more  cultured 
Italy,  in  German  cities  a  rigidly  classical  training  for  youth  and 
early  manhood  was  found  but  poorly  suited  to  the  needs  of  the 
sons  of  wealthy  burners  destined  to  a  commercial  careei\\  The 
rising  commerce  of  the  world  apparently  was  to  rest  on  native 
languages,  and  not  on  elegant  Latin  verse  and  proser)(^The  com- 
mercial classes  soon  fell  back  on  burgher  schools,  elementary 
vernacular  schools,  writing  and  reckoning  schools,  business  ex- 
perience, and  travel  for  the  education  of  their  sons,  leaving  the 
Latin  schools  of  the  hiunanists  to  those  destined  for  the  service  of 
the  Church,  the  law,  teaching,  or  the  higher  state  servic^ 

The  Work  of  Johann  Sturm.     The  most  successful  classical 
school  in  all  Germany,  and  the  one  which  formed  the  pattern  for 

future  classical  creations,  was 
''the  gymnasium  at  Strassburg^ 
under  the  direction  (1536-82) 
of  the  famous  Johann  Sturm, 
or  SturmiuSj  as  he  came  to  call 
himself.  This  was  one  of  the 
early  classical  schools  founded 
by  the  commercial  cities,  but 
it  had  not  been  successful.  In 
1536  the  authorities  invited 
Sturm,  a  graduate  of  the  Uni- 
versity of  Louvain,  and  at  that 
time  a  teacher  of  classics  and 
dialectic  at  Paris^  where  he 
had  come  in  contact  with  the 
humanism  brought  from  Italy, 
to  become  head  of  the  school 
and  reorganize  it.  This  he 
did,  and  during  the  forty-five 
years  he  was  head  of  the  school  it  became  the  most  famous 
classical  school  in  continental  Europe  His  Plan  of  Organization, 
published  in  1538;  his  Letters  to  the  Masters  on  the  course  of 
study,  in  1565;  and  the  record  of  an  examination  of  each  class 
in  the  school,  conducted  in  1578,  all  of  which  have  been  pre- 
served, give  us  a  good  idea  as  to  the  nature  of  the  organ- 
ization and  instruction  (R.  137). 

Sturm  was  a  strong  and  masterful  man,  with  a  genius  for  or- 


FiG.  32.  Johann  Sturm  (1507-89) 

(After  a  contemporary  engraving  by 
Stofflin) 


EDUCATIONAL  RESULTS  OF  THE  REVIVAL    147 

ganization.  Probably  adopting  the  plan  of  the  French  colleges 
(R.  136),  he  organized  his  school  into  ten  classes,  one  for  each 
year  the  pupil  was  to  spend  in  the  school,  and  placed  a  teacher  in 
charge  of  each.  The  ami  and  end  of  education,  as  he  stated  it, 
was  "piety,  knowledge,  and  the  art  of  speaking,"  and  "every 
effort  of  teachers  and  pupils"  should  bend  toward  acquiring 
"knowledge,  and  purity  and  elegance  of  diction."  Of  the  ten 
years  the  pupil  was  to  spend  in  the  gymnasium,  seven  were  to  be 
spent  in  acquiring  a  thorough  mastery  of  pure  idiomatic  Latin, 
and  the  three  remaining  years  to  the  acquisition  of  an  elegant 
Ciceronian  style.'  The  instruction  in  both  Latin  and  Greek  was 
much  like  that'^f  the  court  schools  of  Italy,  except  that  in  Greek 
the  New  Testament  was  read  in  addition.  The  plays  and  games 
and  physical  training  of  the  ItaHan  schools,  however,  were  omit- 
ted ;  much  less  emphasis  was  placed  on  manners  and  gentlemanly 
conduct;  and  in  educational  purpose  a  narrow  drill  was  substitu- 
ted for  the  broad  cultural  sgirjt  of  the  French  and  Italian  schools. 

Colet  and  Samt  PauPs  School.  The  first  real  establishment  of 
the  new  learning  in  England  came  through  the  secondary  schools, 
and  through  the  refounding  of  the  cathedral  school  of  Saint 
Paul's,  in  London,  by  the  humanist  John  Colet,  in  15 10.  Colet 
had  become  Dean  of  Saint  Paul's  Church,  and  Erasmus  urged  him 
to  embrace  the  opportunity  to  reconstruct  the  school  along  hu- 
manistic linesT)  vThis  he  did,  endowing  it  with  all  his  wealth,  and 
in  a  series  of  carefully  drawn-up  Statutes  (R.  138),  which  were 
widely  copied  in  subsequent  foundations,  Colet  laid  special  em- 
phasis on  the  school  giving  training  in  the  new  learning  and  in 
Christian  discipline^)  Erasmus  gave  much  of  his  time  for  years  to 
finding  teachers  arid  writing  textbooks  for  the  school.^  William 
Lily  (1468-15 2  2),  another  early  humanist  recently  returned  from 
study  in  Italy,  and  the  author  of  a  widely  known  and  much  used 
textbook  —  Lily's  Latin  Grammar  (R.  140)  —  was  made  head- 
master of  the  school.") 

The  course  of  stiidy  was  of  the  humanistic  type  already  de- 
scribed, coupled  with  careful  religious  instruction.  In  place  of 
the  monkish  Latin  pure  Latin  and  Greek  were  to  be  taught,  and 
the  best  classical  authors  took  the  place  of  the  old  mediaeval  dis- 
ciplines. LThe  school  met  with  much  opposition,  was  denounced 
as  a  temple  of  idolatry  and  heathenism  by  the  men  of  the  old 
schools,  and  even  the  Bishop  of  London  tried  twice  to  convict 
Colet  of  heresy  and  suppress  the  InstructionN  Notwithstanding 


148        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

this  the  school  became  famous  for  its  work,  not  only  in  London 
but  throughout  England.  From  its  desks  came  a  long  line  of 
capable  statesmen,  learned  clergy,  brilliant  scholars,  and  literary 
men. 

Influence  on  other  English  grammar  schools.  In  a  preceding 
chapter  (p.  148)  we  mentioned  the  founding  of  many  English 
grammar  schools  after  1200.  At  the  time  Saint  Paul's  School 
was  refounded  there  were  something  like  three  hundred  of  these, 
of  all  classes,  in  England.  They  existed  in  connection  with  the 
old  monasteries,  cathedrals,  collegiate  churches,  guilds,  and  char- 
ity foundations  in  connection  with  parish  churches,  while  a  few 
were  due  to  private  benevolence  and  had  been  founded  independ- 
ently of  either  Church  or  State.  The  Sevenoaks  Grammar 
School,  founded  by  the  will  of  William  Sevenoaks,  in  1432  (R. 
141),  and  for  which  he  stated  in  his  will  that  he  desired  as  master 
"an  honest  man,  sufficiently  advanced  and  expert  in  the  science 
of  Grammar,  B.A.,  by  no  means  in  holy  orders,"  and  the  chantry 
grammar  school  founded  by  John  Percyvall,  in  1503  (R.  142),  are 
examples  of  the  parish  type.  The  famous  Winchester  Puljlic 
School,  founded  by  Bishop  William  of  Wykeham,  in  1382,  to  em- 
phasize grammar,  religion,  and  manners,  and  to  prepare  seventy 
scholars  for  New  College,  at  Oxford,  where  they  were  to  be 
trained  as  priests;  and  Eion  College,  founded  by  Henry  VI,  in 
1440,  to  prepare  students  for  King's  College,  at  Cambridge,  are 
examples  of  the  larger  private  foundations.  A  few,  such  as  the 
grammar  school  at  Sandwich  (1579),  owed  their  origin  (R.  143)  to 
the  initiative  of  the  city  authorities.  Most  of  these  grarnmar 
schools  were  small,  but  a  few  were  large  and  wealthy  establish- 
ments. 

These  old  foundations,  with  their  mediaeval  curriculum,  after  a 
time  began  to  feel  the  influence  of  Colet's  school.  Within  a  cen- 
tury, due  to  one  influence  or  another,  practically  all  had  been  re- 
modeled after  the  new  classical  type  set  up  by  Colet.  In  the 
course  of  study  given  for  Eton  (R.  144),  for  1560,  we  see  the  new 
learning  fully  established,  and  in  the  course  of  study  for  a  small 
country  grammar  school,  in  1635  (R.  145),  we  see  how  fully  the 
new  learning,  with  its  emphasis  on  Latin  as  a  living  language,  had 
by  this  time  extended  to  even  the  smallest  of  the  English  grammar 
schools^)  The  new  foundations,  after  15 10,  were  almost  entirely 
new-learning  grammar  schools,  with  large  emphasis  on  grammar, 
good  Latin  and  Greek,  games  and  sports,  and  the  religious  spiritZ^ 


EDUCATIONAL  RESULTS  OF  THE  REVIVAL    149 

"^  The  reaction  against  mediaevalism.  Having  traced  the  intro- 
duction of  the  new  learning  by  countries,  it  still  remains  to  point 
out  certain  significant  educational  features  of  the  movement 
which  were  common  in  all  lands,  and  which  profoundly  modified 
subsequent  educational  practice.  -Both  the  purpose  and  the 
method  of  education  were  permanently  changed,  j 

Up  to  about  the  middle  of  the  fourth  Christian  cejtitury  the  aim 
of  both  Greek  and  Roman  education  had  been  to  prepare  men  to 
become  good  and  useful  citizens  in  the  State.  Then  the  Church 
gained  control  of  education,  and  for  a  thousand  years  the  chief 
object  was  to  prepare  for  the  world  to  come\  Success  and  good 
citizenship  in  this  world  counted  for  little,  religious  devotion  took 
the  place  of  the  old  state  patriotism,  the  salvation  of  souls  took  the 
place  of  the  promotion  of  the  social  welfare,  and  the  aim  and  end 
of  life  here  was  to  attain  everlasting  bliss  in  the  world  to  come"?) 
To  be  able  to  appease  the  dread  Judge  at  the  Day  of  Judgment, 
prayer,  penance,  and  holy  contemplation  were  the  important 
things  here  below.  /  It  was  preeminently  the  age  of  the  self -abas- 
ing monk,  and  this  mental  attitude  dominated  all  thinking  and 
learnin;gj> 

The  spirit  behind  the  Revival  of  Learning  was  a  protest  against 
this  medieval  attitude,  and  the  protest  was  vigorous  and  success- 
ful. The  Revival  of  Learning  was  a  clear  break  with  mediaeval 
traditions  and  with  mediaeval  authority.,  It  restored  to  the  world 
the  ideals  of  earlier  education  —  self-culture,  and  preparation  for 
usefulness  and  success  in  the  world  here/  In  Italy,  France,  Ger- 
many, and  England  the  movement,  too,  met  with  the  most  thor- 
ough approval  from  modem  men^^  merchants,  court  officials, 
and  scholars  who  were  ready  to  break  with  the  mediaeval  type  of 
thinking.  The  court  and  other  types  of  secondary  schools  now 
established  were  popular  with  the  higher  classes  in  society,  and 
this  aristocratic  stamp  the  humanistic  schools  and  courses  have 
ever  since  retained.  ^  These  schools  restored  to  the  world  the  prac- 
tical education  of  the  days  of  Cicero,; and  preparation  for  intelU- 
gent  service  in  the  Church,  State,  and  the  larger  business  life  be- 
came one  of  their  important  purposes.  Supported  as  they  were 
by  the  ruling  classes,  the  new  schools^ere  close  to  the  most  pro- 
gressive forces  in  the  national  life  of  the  different  countries.''  They 
represented  an  unmistakable  reaction  against  the  world  of  the 
mediaeval  monk  and  the  Scholastic^ and  their  early  success  was  in 
large  part  because  of  thisi) 


^ 


150       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

The  schools  become  formal.  After  the  new  learning  had  ob- 
tained a  firm  footing  in  the  schools  there  happened  what  has  often 
happened  in  the  history  of  new  educational  efforts  —  that  is,  the 
new  learning  became  narrow,  formal,  and  fixed,  and  lost  the  lib- 
eral spirit  which  actuated  its  earlier  promoters^  In  the  beginning 
the  Itahan  humanists  had  aimed  at  large  personal  self-culture  and 
individual  development,  and  the  northern  humanists  at  moral 
and  religious  reform  and  preparation  for  useful  service,  both  using 
the  classics  as  a  means  to  these  new  ends!)  After  about  i^oo  in 
Italy,  and  1600  in  the  northern  countries,  when  the  new-learning 
schools  had  become  well  established  and  thoroughly  organized, 
the  tendency  arose  to  make  the  means  an  end  in  itselQ  Instead 
of  using  the  classical  literatures  to  impart  a  liberal  education,  give 
larger  vision,  and  prepare  for  useful  public  service,  they  came  to 
be  used  largely  for  disciplinary  ends.  The  teaching  of  Campion 
at  Prague  (1574)  well  illustrates  this  degeneracy  (R.  146). 

In  consequence  the  aim  of  the  new  humanistic  education  came 
in  time  to  be  thought  of  in  terms  of  languages  and  literatures,  in- 
stead of  in  terms  of  usefulness  as  a  preparation  for  intelligent  liv- 
ing, and  educational  effort  was  transferred  from  the  larger  human 
point  of  view  of  the  early  humanistic  teachers  to  the  narrower  and 
much  less  important  one  of  mastering  Greek  and  Lailn,  writing 
verses,  and  cultivating  a  good  (Ciceronian)  Latin  style.  As  a 
result  of  this  change  in  aim  and  purpose,  classical  education  grad- 
ually became  narrow  and  formal,  and  drill  in  composition  and 
declamation  and  imitation  of  the  style  of  ancient  authors  —  par- 
ticularly Cicero,  whence  the  term  "  Ciceronianism  "  which  came 
to  be  applied  to  it  —  grew  to  be  the  ruling  motives  in  instruction.  \ 
By  the  end  of  the  sixteenth  century  this  change  had  taken  place 
in  both  the  secondary  schools  and  the  universities,  and  this  nar- 
row linguistic  attitude  continued  to  dominate  classical  education, 
in  German  landsuntil  the  mid-eighteenth,  and  in  all  other  west- 
ern European  countries  and  in  America  until  near  the  middle  of 
the  nineteenth,  century. ) 


QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

Explain  just  what  is  meant  by  the  statement  that  mediaeval  education 
was  narrowly  technical. 

State  the  educational  ideals  of  the  new  secondary  schools  evolved  by  the 
Italian  humanistic  scholars,  and  show  whether  these  ideals  have  been 
best  embodied  in  the  German  gymnasium  or  the  English  grammar  school. 
How  do  you  explain  the  merchants  and  bankers  and  princes  of  Italy 


(5C^/T-^w^'/^U^/^^l^<!7£3^^*^    <_y)L 


ei^ucAtional  results  oi^  the  revival  i^i 

being  more  interested  in  the  revival-of-learning  movement  than  the 
Church  and  university  scholars?  Do  such  classes  to-day  show  the  same 
type  of  interest  in  aiding  learning? 

4.  What  was  the  particular  importance  of  the  recovery  of  Quintilian's 
Insiilules?     Of  Cicero's  Orations  and  Letters? 

5.  Show  how  the  type  of  education  developed  in  the  Italian  court  schools 
was  superior  to  that  of  the  best  of  the  cathedral  schools.  To  that  devel- 
oped by  Sturm. 

6.  Show  how  the  new  type  of  secondary  schools  was  naturally  associated 
with  court  and  nobility  and  men  of  large  worldly  affairs,  and  how  in 
consequence  the  new  secondar>'  education  became  and  for  long  con- 
tinued to  be  considered  as  aristocratic  education. 

7.  Had  the  purified  Latin  been  restored,  as  the  general  international  lan- 
guage of  learning  and  government,  would  it  have  helped  materially  in 
bringing  about  the  civilizing  influences  Erasmus  saw  in  it? 

8.  Has  the  development  of  separate  nationalities  and  different  national 
languages  aided  in  advancing  international  peace  and  civilization? 
Why? 

9.  Why  should  the  new  humanistic  studies  have  developed  religious  fervor 
.    in  Germany  and  England,  in  place  of  the  patriotic  fervor  of  the  Italian 

scholars? 

10.  Contrast  the  aim  of  Sturm's  school  with  that  of  the  Italian  court  schools, 
and  the  English  grammar  schools.  Point  out  the  new  tendencies  in  his 
work. 

11.  Show  how  it  was  natural  that  the  first  American  school  should  have  been 
a  Latin  grammar  school  in  type. 

12.  Show  that  the  new  conception  as  to  education,  as  expressed  by  the  new 
humanism,  found  a  public  ready  to  support  it.  What  was  the  nature  of 
this  public? 

13.  Show'  how  the  new  schools  were  "close  to  the  most  progressive  forces  in 
the  national  life,"  and  the  influence  of  this,  particularly  in  England  and 
America,  in  fixing  classical  training  as  the  approved  type  of  secondary 
education. 

14.  Explain  how  the  written  theme  of  to-day  is  the  successor  of  the  mediaeval 
disputation. 

15.  Show  how  the  methods  of  instruction  employed  in  the  new  Latin  gram- 
mar schools  have  been  passed  over  to  the  native-language  schools. 

16.  Show  how  instruction  in  Latin,  by  being  changed  from  cultural  to  disci- 
plinary ends,  made  French  the  language  of  diplomacy  and  society, 
tended  to  elevate  all  the  vernacular  tongues,  and  marked  the  beginnings 
of  the  end  of  the  importance  of  Latin  as  a  school  study  except  for  the 
purposes  of  the  Roman  Catholic  Church. 

17.  Does  it  require  a  higher  quaUty  of  teaching  to  impart  the  cultural  aspect 
of  a  study  than  is  required  for  the  disciphnary? 

SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  selections  are  repro- 
duced: 

135.  Guarino:  On  Teaching  the  Classical  Authors. 

136.  Vinet:  The  College  de  Guyenne  at  Bordeaux. 

137.  Sturm:  Course  of  Study  at  Strassburg. 

138.  Colet:  Statutes  for  St.  Paul's  School,  London. 

(o)  Religious  Observances, 


152       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

(b)  Admission  of  Children. 

(c)  The  Course  of  Study. 

139.  Ascham:  On  Queen  Elizabeth's  Learning. 

140.  Colet:  Introduction  to  Lily's  Latin  Grammar. 

141.  William  Sevenoaks:  Foundation  Bequest  for  Sevenoaks  Grammar. 

School. 

142.  John  Percy  vail:  Foundation  Bequest  for  a  Chantry  Grammar  School. 

143.  Sandwich:  A  City  Grammar  School  Foundation. 

144.  Eton:  Course  of  Study  in  1560. 

145.  Martindale :  Course  of  Study  in  an  English  Country  Grammar  School. 

146.  Simpson:  Degeneracy  of  Classical  Instruction. 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

*Adams,  G.  B.     Civilization  during  the  Middle  Ages. 
Jebb,  R.  C.     Humanism  in  Education. 

Laurie,  S.  S.     Development  of  Educational  Opinion  since  the  Renaissance. 
Laurie,  S.  S.     "The  Renaissance  and  the  School,  1440-1580";  in  School 
Review,  vol.  4,  pp.  140-48,  202-14. 
*Lupton,  J.  H.     A  Life  of  John  Colet. 
Palgrave,  F.  T.     "The  Oxford  Movement  in  the  Fifteenth  Century"; 

in  Nineteenth  Century,  vol.  28,  pp.  812-30.     (Nov.  1890.) 
Seebohm,  F.     The  Oxford  Reformers  of  1498;  Colet,  Erasmus,  More. 
*Stowe,  A.  M.    English  Grammar  Schools  in  the  Reign  of  Queen  Elizabeth. 
*Thurber,  C.  H.    "  Vittorino  da  Feltre";  in  School  Review,  vol.  7,  pp.  295- 
300. 
Watson,  Foster.     English  Grammar  Schools  to  1660. 
*Woodward,  W.  H.     Vittorino  da  Feltre,  and  other  Humanistic  Educators. 
*Woodward,  W.  H.     Education  during  the  Renaissance. 
Woodward,  W.  H.    Desiderius  Erasmus,  Concerning  the  Method  and  Aim 
of  Education. 


CHAPTER  XII 
THE  REVOLT  AGAINST  AUTHORITY 

The  new  questioning  attitude.  The  student  can  hardly  have 
followed  the  history  of  educational  development  thus  far  without 
realizing  that  a  serious  questioning  of  the  practices  and  of  the 
dogmatic  and  repressive  attitude  of  the  omnipresent  mediaeval 
Church  was  certain  to  come,  sooner  or  later,  unless  the  Church 
itself  realized  that  the  mediaeval  conditions  which  once  demanded 
such  an  attitude  were  rapidly  passing  away,  and  that  the  new  life 
in  Christendom  now  called  for  a  progressive  stand  in  religious 
matters  as  in  other  affairs.  The  new  life  resulting  from  the  Cru- 
sades, the  rise  of  commerce  and  industry,  the  organization  of  city 
governments,  the  rise  of  lawyer  and  merchant  classes,  the  forma- 
tion of  new  national  States,  the  rise  of  a  new  ''Estate"  of  trades- 
men and  workers,  the  new  knowledge,  the  evolution  of  the  uni- 
versity organizations,  and  the  discovery  of  the  art  of  printing  — 
all  these  forces  had  united  to  develop  a  new  attitude  toward  the 
old  problems  and  to  prepare  western  Europe  for  a  rapid  evolution 
out  of  the  mediaeval  conditions  which  had  for  so  long  dominated 
all  action  and  thinking.  This  the  Church  should  have  realized, 
and  it  should  have  assumed  toward  the  progressive  tendencies  of 
the  time  the  same  intelligent  attitude  assumed  earlier  toward  the 
rise  of  scholastic  inquiry.  But  it  did  not,  and  by  the  fifteenth 
century  the  situation  had  been  further  aggravated  by  a  marked 
decline  in  morality  on  the  part  of  both  monks  and  clergy,  which 
awakened  deep  and  general  criticism  in  all  lands,  but  particularly 
among  the  northern  peoples. 

The  Revival  of  Learning  was  the  first  clear  break  with  mediae- 
valism.  In  the  critical  and  constructive  attitude  developed  by 
the  scholars  of  the  movement,  their  renunciation  of  the  old  forms 
of  thinking,  the  new  craving  for  truth  for  its  own  sake  which  they 
everywhere  awakened,  and  their  continual  appeal  to  the  original 
sources  of  knowledge  for  guidance,  we  have  the  definite  begin- 
nings of  a  modern  scientific  spirit  which  was  destined  ultimately 
to  question  all  things,  and  in  time  to  usher  in  modern  conceptions 
and  modern  ways  of  thinking.  The  authority  of  the  media?val 
Church  would  be  questioned,  and  out  of  this  questioning  would 


154       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

come  in  time  a  religious  freedom  and  a  religious  tolerance  un- 
known in  the  mediaeval  world.  The  great  world  of  scientific 
truth  would  be  inquired  into  and  the  facts  of  modern  science  es- 
tablished, regardless  of  what  preconceived  ideas,  popular  or  re- 
ligious, might  be  upset  thereby.  The  divine  right  of  kings  to  rule, 
and  to  dispose  of  the  fortunes  and  happiness  of  their  peoples  as 
they  saw  fit,  was  also  destined  to  be  questioned,  and  another  new 
"Estate"  would  in  time  arise  and  substitute,  instead,  in  all  pro- 
gressive lands,  the  divine  right  of  the  common  people.  Religious 
freedom  and  toleration,  scientific  inquiry  and  scholarship,  and 
the  ultimate  rise  of  democracy  were  all  involved  in  the  critical, 
questioning,  and  constructive  attitude  of  the  humanistic  scholars 
of  the  Renaissance.  These  came  historically  in  the  order  just 
stated,  and  in  this  order  we  shall  consider  them. 

Humanism  became  a  religious  reform  movement  in  the  North. 
In  Italy  the  Revival  of  Learning  was  classical  and  scientific  in  its 
methods  and  results,  and  awakened  little  or  no  tendency  toward. 
reHgious  and  moral  reform.  Instead  it  resulted  in  something  of  a 
paganization  of  reHgion,  with  the  result  that  the  Papacy  and  the 
Italian  Church  probably  reached  their  lowest  religious  levels  at 
about  the  time  the  great  religious  agitation  took  place  in  northern 
lands.  Jn  the  latter,  on  the  contrary,  the  introduction  of  human- 
ism awakened  a  new  religious  zeal,  and  religious  reform  and  classi- 
cal learning  there  came  to  be  associated  almost  as  one  movement.^ 
In  England,  Germany,  the  Low  Countries,  and  in  large  parts  of 
northern  France,  the  new  learning  was  at  once  directed  to  relig- 
ious and  moral  ends.  The  patriotic  emotions  roused  in  the  Ital- 
ians by  the  humanistic  movement  were  in  the  northern  countries 
superseded  by  religious  and  moral  emotions,  and  the  constant  ap- 
peal to  sources  turned  the  northern  leaders  almost  at  once  back  to 
the  Church  Fathers  and  the  original  Greek  and  Hebrew  Testa- 
ments for  authority  in  religious  matters. 

Evolution  or  revolution.  (  The  reaction  against  the  mediaeval 
dogmas  of  the  Church  and  £he  demand  by  the  humanists  of  the 
North  for  a  return  to  the  simpler  reUgion  of  Christ  gradually 
grew,  and  in  time  became  more  and  more  insistent. '  This  demand 
was  not  something  which  broke  out  all  at  once  and  with  Luther, 
as  many  seem  to  think.  Had  this  been  so  he  would  soon  have 
been  suppressed,  and  little  more  would  have  been  heard  of  him. 
Listead,  the  literature  of  the  time  clearly  reveals  that  there  had 
been,  for  two  centuries,  an  increasing  criticism  of  the  Church,  and 


THE  REVOLT  AGAINST  AUTHORITY       155 

a  number  of  local  and  unsuccessful  efforts  at  reform  had  been  at- 
^    tempted.    The  demand  for  reform  was  general,  and  of  long  stand- 
0      ing,  outside  of  Italy  and  southern  France.     Had  it  been  heeded 
probably  much  subsequent  history  might  have  been  different. 
Vln  1414  a  Coimcil  of  the  Church  was  called  at  Constance,  in 
Switzerland,  to  heal  the  papal  schism,  and  this  Council  made  a 
serious  attempt  at  church  reform.     After  reuniting  the  Church 
under  one  Pope,  it  drew  up  a  Ust  of  abuses  which  it  ordered  rem- 
edied (R.  149).  ( It  also  attempted  to  estabhsh  a  democratic  form 
of  organization  for  the  government  of  the  Church,  with  Church 
Councils  meeting  from  time  to  time  to  advise  with  the  Pope  and 
formulate  church  policy,  much  like  the  government  of  a  modem 
parliament  and  king.     Had  this  succeeded,  much  future  history 
might  have  been  different  and  the  civilization  of  the  world  to-day 
much  advanced.  CBut  the  attempt  failed,  and  the  absolutism  of 
the  reunited  Papacy  became  stronger  than  ever  before.  (^  Protests 
of  princes,  actions  of  legislative  assemblies,  protests  sometimes  of 
bishops,  the  failing  allegiance  of  men  of  affairs,  the  increasing  con- 
demnation and  ridicule  from  lajonen  and  scholars  —  all  signs  of  a 
^    strong  midercurrent  of  public  opinion  —  seemed  to  have  no  effect 
T    on  those  responsible  for  the  policy  of  the  Church. 
-^       That  the  different  rebellions  and  refusals  of  reform  helped  di- 
rectly to  the  ultimate  break  of  Luther  is  not  probable,  as  Luther 
seems  to  have  worked  out  his  position  by  himself.     Each  of  these 
-    earlier  defiances  of  authority  and  the  later  defiance  of  Luther 
A    were  alike,  though,  in  two  resp)ects.  ^Each  demanded  a  return 
vi    to  the  usages  and  beliefs  and  practices  of  the  earUer  Christian 
>^    Church,  as  derived  from  a  study  of  the  Bible  and  of  the  writings 
N^   of  the  early  Christian  Fathers;  and  each  insisted  that  Christians 
,^^should  be  permitted  to  study  the  Bible  for  themselves,  and  reach 
,^^eir  own  conclusions  as  to  Christian  duty.     In  this  demand  to 
be  allowed  to  go  back  to  the  original  sources  for  authority,  and 
the  assertion  of  the  right  to  personal  investigation  and  conclu- 
sions, we  see  the  new  intellectual  standards  estabhshed  by  the 
Revival  of  Learning  in  full  force.    After  1500  the  rising  demands 
or  moral  reform  and  the  recognition  of  individual  judgment 
could  not  be  put  aside  much  longer.    Unless  there  could  be  evolu- 
tion there  would  be  revolution.     Evolution  was  refused,  and 
revolution  was  the  result. 

Discontent  in  German  lands.    It  happened  that  the  first  revolt 
to  be  successful  in  a  large  way  broke  out  in  Germany,  and  about 


156       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

the  person  of  an  Augustinian  monk  and  Professor  of  Theology  in 
the  University  of  Wittenberg  by  the  name  of  Martin  Luther 
(^  (1483-1546)..  Had  it  not  centered  about  Luther  the  revolt  would 
have  come  about  some  one  else;  had  it  not  come  in  Germany  it 
would  have  come  in  some  other  land.  It  was  the  modern  scien- 
tific spirit  of  inquiry  and  reason  in  conflict  with  the  mediaeval 
spirit  of  dogmatic  authority,  and  two  such  forces  are  sooner  or 
later  destined  to  clash.  Whether  we  be  Catholic  or  Protestant, 
and  whether  we  approve  or  disapprove  of  what  Luther  did  or  of 
his  methods,  makes  Httle  difference  in  this  study.  Over  a  ques- 
tion involving  so  much  religious  partisanship  we  do  not  need  to 
take  sides.  ^  All  that  we  need  concern  ourselves  with  is  that  a  cer- 
tain Martin  Luther  lived,  did  certain  things,  made  certain  stands 
for  what  he  believed  to  be  right,  and  what  he  did,  whether  right 
or  wrong,  whether  beneficial  to  progress  and  civiUzation  or  not, 
stands  as  a  great  historical  fact  with  which  the  student  of  the  his- 
tory of  education  must  take  account.  That  the  same  or  even  bet- 
ter results  might  have  been  arrived  at  in  time  by  other  methods 
may  be  true,  but  what  we  are  concerned  with  is  the  course  which 
history  actually  took. 

There  were  special  reasons  why  the  trouble,  when  once  it  broke, 
made  such  rapid  headway  in  German  lands.  The  Germans  had  a 
long-standing  grudge  against  the  Italian  papal  court,  chiefly  be- 
cause it  had  for  long  been  draining  Germany  of  money  to  support 
the  Italian  Church .  In  fact  it  may  be  said  that  the  whole  Ger- 
man people,  from  the  princes  down  to  the  peasants,  felt  them- 
selves unjustly  treated,  that  the  German  money  which  flowed  to 
Rome  should  be  kept  at  home,  and  that  the  immoral  and  ineffi- 
cient clergy  should  be  replaced  by  upright,  earnest  men  who 
would  attend  better  to  their  religious  duties  (R.  150);  It  was 
these  conditions  which  prepared  the  Germans  for  revolt,  and 
enabled  Luther  to  rally  so  many  of  the  princes  and  people  to  his 
side  when  once  he  had  defied  authority. 

The  German  revolt.  [The  crisis  came  over  the  sale  of  indul- 
gences for  sins  by  the  papal  agent,' Tetzel,  who  began  the  practice 
in  the  neighborhood  of  Wittenberg,  where  Luther  was -a  Professor 
of  Theology,  in  1516.^^  There  is  little  doubt  but  that  Tetzel,  in 
his  zeal  to  raise  money  for  the  rebuilding  of  the  church  of  Saint 
Peter's  at  Rome,  a  great  undertaking  then  under  way,  exceeded 
his  instructions  and  made  claims  as  to  the  nature  and  efficacy  of 
indulgences  which  were  not  warranted  by  church  doctrines. 


'^'^HE  REVOLT  AGAINST  AUTHORITY       157 

Such  would  be  only  human.  The  sale,  however,  irritated  Luther, 
and  he  appealed  to  the  Archbishop  of  Magdeburg  to  prohibit  it. 
Failing  to  obtain  any  satisfaction,  he  followed  the  old  university 


Fig.  ^2>-  Showing  the  Results  of  the  Protestant  Revolts 

custom,  made  out  ninety-five  theses,  or  reasons,  why  he  did  not 
believe  the  practice  Justifiable,^detailed  the  abuses)  set  forth  what 
he  conceived  to  be  the  true  Christian  doctrine  in  the  matter,  and 
challenged  all  comers  to  a  debate  on  the  theses  (R.  151).  Fol- 
lowing true  university  custom,  also,  these  theses  were  made  out  in 
Latin,  and  in  October,  15 17,  Luther  followed  still  another  univer- 
sity custom  and  nailed  them  to  the  church  door  in  Wittenberg. 
(^Luther  was  probably  as  much  surprised  as  any  one  to  find  that 
these  were  at  once  translated  into  German,  printed,  and  in  two 
weeks  had  been  scattered  all  over  Germany^  Within  a  month 
they  were  known  in  all  the  important  centers  of  the  Western 
Christian  world.  They  had  been  carried  everywhere  on  the  cur- 
rents of  discontent.)  Luther  at  first  intended  no  revolt  from  the 
Church,  but  only  a'protest  against  its  practices^  From  one  step 
to  another,  though,  he  was  gradually  led  into  open  rebellion,  and 


158        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

finally,  in  15 20)  was  excommunicated  from  the  Church.  He  then 
expressed  his  defiance  by  publicly  burning  the  bull  of  excommuni- 
cation, together  with  a  volume  of  the  canon  law.  This  was  open 
rebellion,  and  such  heresy  (R.  152)  must  needs  be  stamped  out.^ 
Luther  took  his  stand  on  the  authority  of  the  Scriptures,  and  the 
battle  was  now  Joined  between  the  forces  representing  the  author- 
ity of  the  Church  versus  the  authority  of  the  Bible,  and  salvation 
through  the  Church  versus  salvation  through  personal  faith  and 
works.}  Luther  also  forced  the  issue  for  freedom  of  thought  in 
religious  matters.  It  was,  to  be  sure,  some  three  centuries  before 
freedom  in  religious  thinking  and  worship  became  clearly  recog- 
nized, but  what  the  early  university  masters  and  scholars  had 
stood  for  in  intellectual  matters,  Luther  now  asserted  in  religious 
affairs  as  well,  i 

We  do  not  need  to  follow  the  details  of  the  conflict.  Suffice  it 
to  know  that  great  portions  of  northern  and  western  Germany 
followed  Luther,  as  is  shown  in  Figure  33,  and  that  the  Western 
Church,  which  had  remained  one  for  so  many  centuries  and  been 
the  one  great  unifying  force  in  western  Europe,  was  permanently 
split  by  the  Protestant  Revolt.)  The  large  success  of  Luther  is 
easily  explained  by  the  new  Hfe  which  now  permeated  western 
Europe.  The  world  was  rapidly  becoming  modern,  while  the 
Church,  with  a  perversity  almost  unexplainable,  insisted  upon  re- 
maining mediaeval  and  tried  to  force  others  to  remain  mediaeval 
with  it.  J 

Revolts  in  other  lands.    The  outbreak  in 
Germany  soon  spread  to  other  lands.   Luth- 
eranism  made  rapid  headway  in  Denmark, 
where  the  German  grievances  against  Ital- 
ian rule  were  equally  famiHar,  and  in  1537 
(the  Danish  Dietpevered  all  connection  with 
Kome  and  estErolished  Lutheranism  as  the 
religion  of  the  country.  Norway,  being  then 
a  part  of  Denmark,  was  carried  for  Luther- 
anism also.    In  Sweden  the  Church  was 
1^  I     shorn  of  some  of  its  powers  and  property  in 
Fig.  34.  HuLDREiCH     ^527,  and  in  1592  Lutheranism  was  defi- 
ZwiNGLi  (1487-1531)    nitely  adopted  as  the  religion  for  the  na- 
tion.    This  included  Finland,  then  a  part 
of  Sweden.     An  independent  reform  movement,  closely  akin  to 
Lutheranism  in  its  aims,  made  considerable  headway  in  Ger- 


THE  REVOLT  AGAINST  AUTHORITY      159 

man  Switzerland  contemporaneously  with  the  reform  work  of 
Luther  in  Germany.  This  was  imder  the  leadership  of  a  popu- 
lar humanist  preacher  in  Zurich  by  the  name  of  Huldreich 
Zwingli. 

In  England  the  struggle  came  nominally  over  the  divorce  (1533) 
of  Henry  VIII  from  Catherine  of  Aragon,  though  the  independ- 
ence of  the  English  Church  had  been  asserted  from  time  to  time 
for  two  centuries,  and  a  free  National  Church  had  for  long  been 
a  growing  ideal  with  English  statesmen.  In  1534  ParHament 
passed  the^^ct  of  Supremacy)  (R.  153)  which  severed  England 
from  Rome. "  By  it  the  King  Vas  made  head  of  the  English  Na- 
tional Church.  The  change  was  in  no  sense  a  profound  one,  such 
as  had  taken  place  in  Lutheran  Germany.  The  priests  who  took 
the  new  oath  of  allegiance  to  the  King  instead  of  the  Pope  as  the 
he^d  of  the  Church,  as  most  of  them  did,  continued  in  the 
churches,  the  service  was  changed  to  EngHsh,  some  reforms  were 
instituted,  but  the  people  did  not  experience  any  great  change  in 
rehgious  feeling  or  ideas.  This  new  National  Church  became 
known  as  the  EngUsh  or  Anglican  Church. 

So  far  as  the  early  history  of  America  is  concerned,  the  most 
important  reform  movement  was  nei- 
ther Lutheranism  nor  Anglicanism,  but 
Calvinism.  In  j^^  John  Calvin,  a 
French  Protestant  who  had  fled  to 
Switzerland,  was  invited  to  submit  a 
plan  for  the  educational  and  religious 
reorganization  of  the  city  of  GenevaJ 
and  in  1541  he  was  entrusted  with  the 
task  of  organizing  there  a  little  religi- 
ous City-Repubhc.  For  this  he  estab- 
lished a  combined  church  and  city 
government,  in  which  religious  affairs 
and  the  civil  government  were  as 
closely  connected  as  they  had  ever 
been  in  any  Catholic  country.'A  Dur- 
ing the  twenty-three  years  that  Calvin 
dominated  Geneva  it  became  the  Rome 
of  Protestantism.'^ 

From  Geneva  a  reformed  Calvinistic  religion  spread  over 
northern  France,  where  its  followers  became  known  as  Huguenots; 
to  Scotland  (1560)  where  they  were  known  as  Scotch  Presbyterians; 


Fig.  35-  John  Calvin 

(1509-1564) 

(Drawn  from  a  contemporary 
p>ainting) 


i6o       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

to  the  Netherlands  (1572)  where  originated  the  Dutch  Reformed 
Church;  and  to  portions  of  central  England,  where  those  who  em- 
braced it  became  known  as  Puritans. ,  Through  the  Puritans  who 
settled  New  England,  and  later  through  the  Huguenots  in  the 
Carolinasj  the  Scotch  Presbyterians  in  the  central  colonies^  and 
(  the  Dutch  in  New  York,  Calvinism  was  carried  to  America,  was 
for  long  the  dominant  religious  belief,  and  profoundly  colored  all 
early  American  education.J  Luthefanism  also  came  in  through 
the  Swedes  along  the  Delaware  and  the  Germans  in  Pennsylvania^ 
while  the  Anglican  Church,  known  in  America  as  the  Episco- 
palian, came  in  through  the  landed  aristocracy  in  Virginia  and 
the  later  settlers  in  New  York.)  The  early  settlement  of  America 
.  was  thus  a  Protestant  settlement,  while  the  migration  to  America 
of  large  numbers  of  peoples  from  Catholic  lands  is  a  relatively 
recent  movement.  ; 

Religious  freedom  and  religious  warfare.  Of  course  the  revolt 
against  the  authority  of  the  Church,  once  inaugurated,  could  not 
be  stopped.  The  same  right  to  freedom  in  religious  belief  which 
Luther  claimed  for  himself  and  his  followers  had  of  course  to  be 
extended  to  others,  i^his  the  Protestants  were  not  much  more 
wiUing  to  grant  than  had  been  the  Catholics  before  them.  \  The 
world  was  not  as  yet  ready  for  such  rapid  advances,  and  religious 
toleration,  though  established  in  principle  by  the  revolt,  was  an 
idea  to  which  the  world  has  required  a  long  time  to  become  accus- 
tomed r)  It  took  two  centuries  of  intermittent  religious  warfare, 
during  which  Catholic  and  Prptestant  waged  war  on  one  another, 
plundered  and  pillaged  landsyjind  murdered  one  another  for  the 
salvation  of  their  respective  souls^  before  the  people  of  western 
Europe  were  willing  to  stop  fighting  and  begin  to  recognize  for 
others  that  which  they  were  fighting  for  for  themselves. ;  When 
religious  tolerance  finally  became  established  by  law,  civilization 
had  made  a  tremendous  advance.  ]  ,  - 

Changed  attitude  toward  the  old  problems.  -The  Peace  of 
Westphalia  (1648),  ^hich  ended  the  bloody  Thirty  Years'  War,  it- 
self the  culmination  of  a  century  of  bitter  and  vindictive  rehgious 
strife,  has  often  been  regarded  as  both  an  end  and  a  beginning^ 
Though  the  persecution  of  minorities  for  a  time  continued,  es- 
pecially in  France,  this  treaty  marked  the  end  of  the  attempt 
of  the  Church  and  the  Catholic  States  to  stamp  out  Protestant- 
ism on  the  continent  of  Europe.  \  The  religious  independence  of 
the  Protestant  States  was  now  acknowledged,  and  the  begin- 


THE  REVOLT  AGAINST  AUTHORITY       i6i 

nings  of  religious  freedom  were  established  by  treaty.  This  new 
freedom  of  conscience,  once  definitely  begun  for  the  ruhng  princes, 
was  certain  in  time  to  be  extended  further.  Ultimately  the  day 
must  come,  though  it  might  be  centuries  away,  when  individual 
as  well  as  national  freedom  in  religious  matters  must  be  granted 
as  a  right,  and  one  of  the  greatest  blessings  of  mankind  finally  be 
firmly  estabUshed  by  law^ 

Physically  exhausted,  and  recognizing  at  last  the  futility  of  fire 
and  sword  as  means  for  stamping  out  opposing  religious  convic- 
tions^ but  still  thoroughly  convinced  as  to  the  correctness  of  their 
respective  points  of  view,  both  sides  now  settled  down  to  another 
century  and  more  of  religious  hatred,  suspicion,  and  intolerance, 
and  to  a  close  supervision  of  both  preaching  and  teaching  as  safe- 
guards to  orthodoxy.  M)uring  the  century  following  the  Peace  of 
Westphalia  greater  reliance  than  ever  before  was  placed  on  the 
school  as  a  means  for  protecting  the  faith,  and  the  pulpit  and  the 
school  now  took  the  place  of  the  sword  and  the  torch  as  convert- 
ing and  holding  agents. 

Religious  reform.  The  effect  of  the  Protestant  Revolts  on  the 
Church  was  good.  For  the  first  time  in  history  Catholic  church- 
men learned  that  they  could  not  rely  on  the  general  acceptance  of 
any  teachings  they  promulgated,  or  any  practices  they  saw  fit  to 
approve.  The  spirit  of  inquiry  which  had  been  aroused  by  the 
methods  of  the  humanists  would  in  the  future  force  them  to  ex- 
plain and  to  defend.  V  If  they  were  to  make  headway  against  this 
great  rebellion  they  must  reform  abuses,  purify  church  practices, 
and  see  that  monks  and  clergy  led  upright  Christian  Uves.  Un- 
less the  mass  of  the  people  could  be  made  loyal  to  the  Church  by 
reverence  for  it,  further  reyplts  and  the  ultimate  break-up  of  the 
institution  were  in  prospect.  The  Council  of  Trent  (1545-63)  at 
last  undertook  the  reform  which  should  have  come  at  least  a  cen- 
tury before.  \JBetter  men  were  selected  for  the  church  offices,  and 
bishops  and  clergy  were  ordered  to  reside  in  their  proper  places 
and  to  preach  regularly.  New  religious  orders  arose,  whose  pur- 
pose was  to  prepare  priests  better  for  the  service  of  the  Church 
and  for  ministry  to  the  needs  of  the  people.  Irritating  practices 
were  abandoned.  LThe  laws  and  doctrines  of  the  Church  were  re- 
stated, in  new  and  better  form.)  Moral  reforms  were  instituted. 
In  most  particulars  the  Reforms  forced  by  the  work  of  Luther  were 
thorough  and  completel  and  since  the  middle  of  the  sixteenth  cen- 
tury the  Catholic  ChurcK^in  morals  and  government,  has  been  a 


i62       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

reformed  Church.]  Above  all,  attention  was  turned  to  education 
rather  than  force  as  a  means  of  winning  and  holding  territory.  A 
rigid  quarantine  was,  however,  estabhshed  in  Catholic  lands 
against  the  further  spread  of  heretical  textbooks  and  literature. 
Especially  was  the  reading  of  the  Bible,  which  had  been  the  cause 
of  all  the  trouble,  for  a  time  rigidly  prohibited^ 

Such,  in  brief,  are  the  historical  facts  connected  with  the  various 
revolts  against  authority  A^hich  split  the  Roman  Catholic  Church 
in  the  sixteenth  century.'  These  have  been  stated,  as  briefly  and 
as  impartially  as  possible,  because  so  much  of  future  educational 
history  arose  out  of  the  conditions  resulting  from  these  revolts. 
The  early  educational  history  of  America  is  hardly  understand- 
able without  some  knowledge  of  the  religious  forces  awakened 
by  the  work  of  the  ProtestantsT  To  the  educational  significance 
and  consequences  of  these  revolts  we  next  turn. 

QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

1.  How  do  you  explain  the  difference  in  the  effect,  on  the  scholars  of  the 
time,  of  the  Revival  of  Learning  in  Italy  and  in  northern  lands? 

2.  How  do  you  explain  the  serious  church  opposition  to  the  different  at- 
tempts of  northern  scholars  to  try  to  turn  the  Church  back  to  the  simpler 
religious  ideals  and  practices  of  early  Christianity? 

3.  Explain  how  opposition  to  the  practices  of  the  Church  covild  be  organ- 
ized into  a  political  force. 

4.  Explain  the  analogy  of  a  heretic  in  the  fifteenth  century  and  an  anarchist 
of  to-day. 

5.  Assuming  that  the  Church  had  encouraged  progressive  evolution  as  a 
policy,  and  thus  warded  off  revolution  and  disruption,  in  what  ways 
might  history  have  been  different? 

6.  How  can  the  bitter  opposition  to  the  reading  and  study  of  the  Bible  be 
explained? 

7.  Show  the  analogy  between  the  freedom  of  thinking  demanded  by  Luther, 
and  that  obtained  three  centuries  earlier  by  the  scholars  in  the  rising 
universities.    Why  were'  the  universities  not  opposed? 

8.  Enumerate  the  changes  which  had  taken  place  in  western  Europe  be- 
tween the  days  of  Wycliffe  and  Huss  and  the  time  of  Luther,  which  en- 
abled him  to  succeed  where  they  had  failed. 

9.  Explain  in  what  way's  the  Protestant  Revolt  was  essentially  a  revolution 
in  thinking,  and  that,  once  started,  certain  other  consequences  must 
inevitably  follow  in  time. 

10.  Was  it  perfectly  natural  that  the  reformers  should  refuse  to  their  follow- 
ers the  same  right  to  revolt,  and  separate  off  into  smaller  and  still  differ- 
ent sects,  which  they  had  contended  for  for  themselves?    Why? 

11.  On  what  basis  could  Catholic  and  Protestant  wage  war  on  one  another 
to  try  to  enforce  their  own  particular  belief? 


THE  REVOLT  AGAINST  AUTHORITY       163 

SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  selections  are  repro- 
duced: 

147.  WycUffe:  On  the  Enemies  of  Christ. 

148.  WycUfi&tes:  Attack  the  Pope  and  the  Practice  of  Indulgences. 

149.  Council  of  Constance:  List  of  Church  Abuses  demanding  Reform. 

150.  Geiler:  A  German  Priest's  View  as  to  Coming  Reform. 

151.  Luther:  Illustrations  from  his  Ninety-Five  Theses. 

152.  Saint  Thomas  Aquinas:  On  the  Treatment  of  Heresy. 

153.  Henry  VIII:  The  EngUsh  Act  of  Supremacy. 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

*Adams,  G.  B.     Civilization  during  the  Middle  Ages. 
Beard,  Charles.     Martin  Luther  and  the  Reformation. 
Beard,  Charles.     The  Reformation  of  the  Sixteenth  Century  in  its  Relation 

to  Modern  Thought  and  Knowledge.     (Hibbert  Lectures,  1883.) 
Fisher,  George  P.     History  of  the  Reformation. 
Gasquet,  F.  A.     Eve  of  the  Reformation. 
Johnson,  A.  H.    Europe  in  the  Sixteenth  Century. 
Perry,  George  G.    History  of  the  Reforvmtion  in  England. 


'hW^^H^ 


CHAPTER  XIII 

EDUCATIONAL  RESULTS  OF  THE  PROTESTANT 
REVOLTS 

I.  AMONG  LUTHERANS  AND  ANGLICANS 

Ultimate  consequences  of  the  break  with  authority.  That  the 
Protestant  Revolts  in  the  different  lands  produced  large  immedi- 
ate and  permanent  changes  in  the  character  of  the  education  pro- 
vided in  the  revolting  States  is  no  longer  accepted  as  being  the 
case.^^  In  every  phase  of  educational  history  growth  has  pro- 
ceeded by  evolution  rather  than  by  revolution,  and  this  applies  to 
the  Protestant  Revolts  as  well  as  to  other  revolutions.  Many 
changes  naturally  resulted  at  once,  some  of  which  were  good  and 
some  of  which  were  not,  while  others  which  were  enthusiastically 
attempted  failed  of  results  because  they  involved  too  great  ad- 
vances for  the  time.^.  Much,  too,  of  the  progress  that  was  inaugu- 
rated was  lost  in  tHe  more  than  a  century  of  religious  strife  which 
f ollowed^:  and  the  additional  century  and  more  of  suspicion,  ha- 
tred, religious  formalism,  and  strict  religious  conformity  which 
followed  the  period  of  religious  strife.  The  educational  signifi- 
cance of  the  reformation  movement,  though,  lies  in  the  far-reach- 
ing nature  of  its  larger  results  and  ultimate  consequences  rather 
than  in  its  immediate  accomplishments,  and  because  of  this  the 
importance  of  the  immediate  changes  effected  have  been  over- 
estimated by  Protestants  and  underestimated  by  CathoUcs. 
V  The  dominant  idea  underlying  Luther's  break  with  authority, 
and  for  that  matter  the  revolts  of  Wycliffe,  Huss,  Zwingli,  and 
Calvin  as  well,  was  that  of  substituting  the  authority  of  the  Bible 
in  religious  matters  for  the  authority  of  the  Church -jof  substitut- 
ing individual  judgment  in  the  interpretation  of  the  Scriptures 
and  in  formulating  decisions  as  to  Christian  duty  for  the  collective 
judgment  of  the  Church;  and  of  substituting  individual  respon- 
sibility for  salvation,  in  Luther's  conception  of  justification 
through  personal  faith  and  prayer,  for  the  collective  responsibility 
for  salvation  of  the  Church.  Whether  one  believes  that  the 
Protestant  position  was  sound  or  not  depends  almost  entirely 
upon  one's  religious  training  and  beliefs,  and  need  not  concern 
us  here,  as  it  makes  no  difference  with  the  course  of  history.    We 


RESULTS  AMONG  LUTHERANS  165 

can  believe  either  way,  and  the  course  that  history  took  remains 
the  same.  The  educational  consequences  of  the  position  taken 
by  the  Protestants,  though,  are  important. 

Under  the  older  theory  of  collective  Judgment  and  collective 
responsibility  for  salvation  —  that  is,  the  judgment  of  the  Church 
rather  than  that  of  individuals  —  it  was  not  important  that  more 
than  a  few  be  educated.j  Under  the  new  theory  of  individual 
judgment  and  individual  responsibiUty  promulgated  by  the  Prot- 
estants it  became  very  important,  in  theory  at  least,  that  every 
one  should  be  able  to  read  the  word  of  God,  participate  intelli- 
gently in  the  church  services,  and  shape  his  life  as  he  understood 
was  in  accordance  with  the  commandments  of  the  Heavenly 
Father.  This  undoubtedly  called  for  the  education  of  all.  Still 
more,  from  individual  participation  in  the  services  of  the  Church, 
with  freedom  of  judgment  and  personal  responsibility  in  religious 
matters,  to  individual  participation  in  and  responsibility  for  the 
conduct  of  government  was  not  a  long  step,  and  the  rise  of  demo- 
cratic governments  and  the  provision  of  universal  education  were 
the  natural  and  ultimate  corollaries,  though  not  immediately 
attained,  of  the  Protestant  position  regarding  the  interpretation 
of  the  Scriptures  and  the  place  and  authority  of  the  Church.;  This 
was  soon  seen  and  acted  upon.  The  great  struggle  of  the  sixteenth 
and  seventeenth  centuries,  in  consequence,  became  one  for  reli- 
gious freedom  and  toleration;) the  great  struggle  of  the  eighteenth 
and  nineteenth  centuries  has  been  for  political  freedom  and  polit- 
ical rights;  to  supply  universal  education  has  been  left  to  the  nine- 
teenth and  the  twentieth  centuries. 

A  new  demand  for  vernacular  schools.  The  invention  of  print- 
ing and  the  Protestant  Revolts  were  in  a  sense  two  revolutionary 
forces,  which  in  combination  soon  produced  vast  and  far-reaching 
changes.  )  The  discovery  of  the  process  of  making  paper  and  the 
invention  of  the  printing-press  changed  the  whole  situation  as  to 
books.  These  could  now  be  reproduced  rapidly  and  in  large  num- 
bers, and  could  be  sold  at  but  a  small  fraction  of  their  former  cost. 
•sThe  printing  of  the  Bible  in  the  common  tongue  did  far  more  to 
stimulate  a  desire  to  be  able  to  read  than  did  the  Revival  of 
Learning  (Rs.  155,  170). )  Then  came  the  religious  discussions  of 
the  Reformation  period/ which  stirred  intellectually  the  masses 
of  the  people  in  northern  lands  as  nothing  before  in  history  had 
ever  done. 
(The  leaders  of  the  Protestant  Revolts,  too,  in  asserting  that 


i66        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

each  person  should  be  able  to  read  and  study  the  Scriptures  as  a 
means  to  personal  salvation,  created  an  entirely  new  demand,  in 
Protestant  lands,  for  elementary  schools  in  the  vernacular.  Here- 
tofore the  demand  had  been  for  schools  only  for  those  who  ex- 
pected to  become  scholars  or  leaders  in  Church  or  State^  while 
the  masses  of  the  people  had  little  or  no  interest  in  learning.  '  Now 
a  new  class  became  desirous  of  learning  to  read,  not  Latin,  but  the 
language  which  they  had  already  learned  to  speaJ^  ^^Luther, 
besides  translating  the  Bible,  had  prepared  two  general  Cate- 
chisms, one  for  adults  and  one  for  children,  had  written  hymns, 
and  issued  numerous  letters  and  sermons  in  behalf  of  reUgious 
education.  In  his  sermons  and  addresses  he  urged  a  study  of  the 
Bible  and  the  duty  of  sending  children  to  school.  Calvin's  Cate- 
chism similarly  was  extensively  used  in  Protestant  lands^'' 

I.  Lutheran  School  Organization 

Educational  ideas  of  Luther.  Luther  enunciated  the  most 
progressive  ideas  on  education  of  all  the  German  Protestant  re- 
formers. ;  In  his  Letter  to  the  Mayors  and  Aldermen  of  all  the  Cities 
of  Germany  in  behalf  of  Christian  Schools  (1524)  (R.  156),  and  in 
his  Sermon  on  the  Duty  of  Sending  Children  to  School  (1530),  we 
find  these  set  forth.  That  his  ideas  could  be  but  partially  carried 
out  is  not  surprising.  There  were  but  few  among  his  followers 
who  could  understand  such  progressive  proposals,  they  were 
entirely  too  advanced  for  the  time,  there  was  no  body  of  vernacu- 
lar teachers  or  means  to  prepare  them,  the  importance  of  such 
training  was  not  understood,  and  the  religious  wars  which  fol- 
lowed made  such  educational  advantages  impossible,  for  a  long 
time  to  come,^  The  sad  condition  of  the  schools,  which  he  said 
were  "deteriorating  throughout  Germany,"  awakened  his  deep 
regret,  and  he  begged  of  those  in  authority  "not  to  think  of  the 
subject  lightly,  for  the  instruction  of  youth  is  a  matter  in  which 
Christ  and  all  the  world  are  concerned."  All  towns  had  to  spend 
money  for  roads,  defense,  bridges,  and  the  like,  and  why  not  some 
for  schools?  This  they  now  could  easily  afford,  ("since  Divine 
Grace  has  released  them  from  the  exaction  and  robbery  of  the 
Roman  Church."  Parents  continually  neglected  their  educational 
duty,  yet  there  must  be  civil  government.  "Were  there  neither 
soul,  heaven,  nor  hell,"  he  declared,  "it  would  still  be  necessary 
to  have  schools  for  the  sake  of  affairs  here  below.  .  .  .  The  world 
has  need  of  educated  men  and  women  to  the  end  that  men  may 


RESULTS  AMONG  LUTHERANS  167 

govern  the  country  properly  and  women  may  properly  bring  up 
their  children,  care  for  their  domestics,  and  direct  the  affairs  of 
their  households."  "The  welfare  of  the  State  depends  upon  the 
inteUigence  and  virtue  of  its  citizens,"  he  said,  "and  it  is  therefore 
the  duty  of  mayors  and  aldermen  in  all  cities  to  see  that  Christian 
schools  are  founded  and  maintained"  (R.  156). 

The  parents  of  children  he  held  responsible  for  their  Christian 
and  civic  education.  This  must  be  free,  and  equally  open  to  all 
—  boys  and  girls,  high  and  low,  rich  and  poor.  It  was  the  inher- 
ent right  of  each  child  to  be  educated,  and  the  State  must  not  only 
see  that  the  means  are  provided,  but  also  require  attendance  at 
the  schools  (R.  158).  At  the  basis  of  all  education  lay  Christian 
education.""^,  The  importance  of  the  services  of  the  teacher  was 
beyond  or'dinary  comprehension  (R.  157).  Teachers  should  be 
trained  for  their  work,  and  clergymen  should  have  had  experience 
as  teachers.  A  school  system  for  German  people  should  be  a 
state  system,  divided  into: 

1.  Vernacular  Primary  Schools.  Schools  for  the  common  people, 
to  be  taught  in  the  vernacular,  to  be  open  to  both  sexes,  to  include 
reading,  writing,  physical  training,  singing,  and  religion,  and  to  give 
practical  instruction  in  a  trade  or  in  household  duties.  Upon  this 
attendance  should  be  compulsory.  "  It  is  my  opinion,"  he  said,  "that 
we  should  send  boys  to  school  for  one  or  two  hours  a  day,  and  have 
them  learn  a  trade  at  home  the  rest  of  the  time?)  It  is  desirable  that 
these  two  occupations  march  side  by  side." 

2.  Latin  Secondary  Schools.  (Vpon  these  he  placed  great  emphasis 
(R.  156)  as  preparatory  schooTs  by  means  of  which  a  learned  clergy 
was  to  be  perpetuated  for  the  instruction  of  the  people.  /  In  these  he 
would  teach  Latin,  Greek,  Hebrew,  rhetoric,  dialectic,  hStory,  science, 
mathematics,  music,  and  gymnastics. 

3.  The  Universities.  For  training  for  the  higher  service  in  Church 
and  State.  ) 

Early  German  state  school  systems.  The  first  German  State 
to  organize  a  complete  system  of  schools  was  Wiirtemberg  (R. 
162),  in  southwestern  Germany,  in  1559."^  This  marks  the  real 
beginning  of  the  German  state  school  systems.  Three  classes 
of  schools  were  provided  for: 

(i)  Elementary  schools,  for  both  sexes,  in  which  were  to  be  taught 
reading,  writing,  reckoning,  singing,  and  reUgion,  all  in  the  vernacular. 
These  were  to  be  provided  in  every  village  in  the  Duchy. 

(2)  Latin  schools  {Particular schulen) ,  with  five  or  six  classes,  in  which 
the  ability  to  read,  write,  and  speak  Latin,  together  with  the  elements 
of  mathematics  and  Greek  in  the  last  year,  were  to  be  taught. 


i68       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

(3)  The  universities  or  colleges  of  the  State,  of  which  the  University 
of  Tubingen  (f.  1476)  and  the  higher  school  at  Stuttgart  were  declared 
to  be  constituent  parts. 

Acting  through  the  church  authorities,  these  schools  were  to  be 
under  the  supervision  of  the  State. 

The  example  of  Wurtemberg  was  followed  by  a  number  of  the 
smaller  German  States.  Ten  years  later  Brunswick  followed  the 
same  plan,  and  in  1580  Saxony  revised  its  school  organization, 
after  the  state-system  plan  thus  established.  In  1619  the  Duchy 
of  Weimar  added  compulsory  education  in  the  vernacular  for  all 
children  from  six  to  twelve  years  of  age?  In  1642,  the  same  date 
as  the  first  Massachusetts  school  law  (chapter  xv),  Duke  Ernest 
the  Pious  of  little  Saxe-Gotha  and  Altenburg  established  the 
first  school  system  of  a  modem  type  in  German  lands.  An 
intelligent  and  ardent  Protestant,  he  attempted  to  elevate  his 
miserable  peasants,  after  the  ravages  of  the  Thirty  Years'  War, 
by  a  wise  economic  administration  and  universal  education.  ) 
With  the  help  of  a  disciple  of  the  greatest  educational  thinker  of 
the  period,  John  Amos  Comenius  (chapter  xvn),  he  worked  out 
a  School  Code  (Schulmetkode,  1642)  which  was  the  pedagogic} 
V  masterpiece  of  the  seventeenth  century  (R.  163).  In  it  he  pro- 
vided for  compulsory  school  attendance,  and  regulated  the  details 
of  method,  grading,  and  courses  of  study.  Teachers  were  paid  sal- 
aries which  for  the  time  were  large,  pensions  for  their  widows  and 
children  were  provided,  and  textbooks  were  prepared  and  sup- 
plied free.  So  successful  were  his  efforts  that  Gotha  became  one 
of  the  most  prosperous  little  spots  in  Europe,  and  it  was  said 
that  "Duke  Ernest's  peasants  were  better  educated  than  noble- 
men anywhere  else."  ; 

By  the  middle  of  the  seventeenth  century  most  of  the  Grerman 
States  had  followed  the  Wurtemberg  plan  of  organization.  Even 
Duke  Albrecht  V  of  Bavaria,  which  was  a  Catholic  State,  or- 
dered the  establishment  of  "German  schools"  thr6ughout  his 
realm,  with  instruction  in  reading,  writing,  and  the  Catholic 
creed,  the  schools  to  be  responsible  through  the  Church  to  the 
State. 

Protestant  state  school  organization.    We  see  here  in  German 

lands  a  new,  and,  for  the  future,  a  very  important  tendency. 

,  Throughout  all  the  long  Middle  Ages  the  Church  had  absolutely 

controlled  all  education.    (From  the  suppression  of  the  pagan 

schools,  in  579  a.d.,  to  the  time  of  the  Reformation  there  had  been 


RESULTS  AMONG  LUTHERANS 


169 


Roman  Catholic 

CHURCH 

State  School 


The 
Middle 
Asea 


Lutheran 


SUte     -   Church    -    School 


Eaiir 

Refonnatkm 

Period. 

Bnsenhasra 
Ifelanefatbon 


State     . 


Later 

Reformation 

Period. 

Saxony 

Wiirtemberg 

Gotha 

Bavaria 


GERMAN  STATES 


E 


eiman  Scfaoolsj 


Lutheran 
Churdi 


Catholic 
Church 


The 

Nineteenth 

Century 

Ptmsn 
Saxony 
^*^  "***""'*' If 
Bavaria 
Baden 


no  one  tp  dispute  with  the  Church  its  complete  monopoly  of  edu- 
cation. Even  Charlemagne's  attempt  at  the  stimulation  of  edu- 
cational activity  had  been  clearly  within  the  lines  of  church  con- 
trol. ^  Until  the  beginnings  of  the  modem  States,  following  the 
Crusades,  the  Church  had 
been  the  State  as  well,  and 
for  long  humbled  any  ruler 
who  dared  dispute  its  f)ower. 
In  the  later  Middle  Ages 
nobles  and  rising  parliaments 
had  at  times  sided  with  the 
king  against  the  Church  — 
warm'ngs  of  a  changing  Eu- 
rope that  the  Church  should 
have  heeded  —  but  there  had 
been  no  serious  trouble  with 
the  rising  nationalities  before 
the  sixteenth  century.  Now, 
in  Protestant  lands',  all  was 
changed.  /The  authority  of 
the  Church  was  overthrown.^ 
By  the  Peace  of  Augsburg 
(1555)  each  German  prince  and  town  and  knight  were  to  be 
permitted  to  make  choice  between  the  Catholic  and  Lutheran 
faith,  and  all  subjects  were  to  accept  the  faith  of  their  ruler  or 
emigrate. 

This  established  freedom  of  conscience  for  the  rulers,  but  for 
no  one  else.  It  also  gave  them  control  of  both  religious  and  secu- 
lar affairs,  thus  uniting  in  the  person  of  the  ruler,  large  or  small, 
control  of  both  Church  and  State.  This  was  as  much  progress 
toward  religious  freedom  as  the  world  was  then  ready  for.  as 
Church  and  State  had  been  united  for  so  many  centuries  that  a 
complete  separation  of  the  two  was  almost  inconceivable.  It  was 
left  for  the  United  States  (1787)  to  completely  divorce  Church 
and  State,  and  to  reduce  the  churches  to  the  control  of  purely 
spiritual  affairs.^ 

The  German  rulers,  however,  were  now  free  to  develop  schools 
as  they  saw  fit,  and,  through  their  headship  of  the  Church  in  their 
principality  or  duchy  or  city,  to  control  education  therein.  (^We 
have  here. the  beginnings  of  the  transfer  of  educational  control 
from  the  Church  to  the  State,  the  ultimate  fruition  of  which  came 


Fig.  36.  Evolution  of  German 
State  School  Control 


^ 


170       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

first  in  German  lands,  and  which  was  to  be  the  great  work  of  the 
nineteenth  century^  It  was  through  the  kingly  or  ducal  headship 
of  the  Church,  and  through  it  of  the  educational  system  of  the 
kingdom  or  duchy,  that  the  great  educational  development  in 
Wiirtemberg,  Saxony,  and  Gotha  was  brought  about  by  their 
rulers,  and  it  was  through  the  ruling  princes  that  the  German 
universities  were  reformed  and  the  new  Protestant  universities 
established.  Even  in  Catholic  States,  as  Bavaria,  the  German 
state-control  idea  took  root  early^  Many  of  the  important  fea- 
tures of  the  modern  German  school  systems  are  to  be  seen  in 
their  beginnings  in  the  Lutheran  state-church  schools.    ) 

2 .  A  nglican  foundations 

The  Reformation  and  education  in  Ejjgland.  The  Reformation 
in  England  took  a  very  different  direction  from  what  it  did  in 
Germany,  and  its  educational  results  in  consequence  were  very 
different.  In  England  the  reform  movement  was  much  more 
political  in  character  than  in  German  lands.  Henry  VIII  was  no 
Protestant,  in  the  sense  that  Luther  or  Calvin  or  Zwingli  or  Knox 
was.^He  distrusted  their  teachings,  and  was  always  anxious  to 
e^§.m  objections  to  the  old  faith.  The  people  of  England  as  a 
body,  too,  had  been  much  less  antagonized  by  the  exactions  of 
the  Roman  Church  and  the  immoral  lives  of  the  monks  and 
Roman  clergy;  the  new  learning  had  awakejted  there  somewhat 
less  of  a  spirit  of  moral  and  religious  reformf  and  the  reformation 
movement  of  Luther,  after  a  decade  and  a  half,  had  roused  no 
general  interest^  The  change  from  the  Roman  Catholic  faith 
to  an  independent  English  Church,  when  made,  was  in  conse- 
quence much  more  nominal  than  had  been  the  case  in  German 
lands  J  As  a  result  the  severance  from  Rome  was  largely  carried 
out  by  the  ruling  classes,  and  the  masses  of  the  people  were  in 
no  way  deeply  interested  in  it.j  The  English  National  Church 
merely  took  over  most  of  the  functions  formerly  exercised  by  the 
Roman  Church,  in  general  the  same  priests  remained  in  charge 
of  the  parish  churches,  and  the  church  doctrines  and  church 
practices  were  not  greatly  altered  by  the  change  in  allegiance^ 
The  changing  of  the  service  from  Latin  to  English  was  perhaps  the 
most  important  change. \  The  English  Church,  in  spirit  and  serv- 
ice, has  in  consequence  retained  the  greatest  resemblance  to  the 
Roman  Catholic  Church  of  any  Protestant  denomination.""  In 
particular!  the  Lutheran  idea  of  personal  responsibility  for  salva« 


Plate  2 .  Stratford-on-Avon  Grammar  School 

Established  by  the  Holy  Cross  Guild  of  Stratford-oh-Avon,  at  the  beginning  of  the 
fifteenth  century.  The  Grammar  School  was  built  in  1426,  of  wood,  and  at  a  cost 
of  £10, 5s.,  35^.  The  stone  guild-chapel  to  the  left  is  older.  The  school  was  held  on  the 
upf>er  floor,  the  lower  being  used  as  a  guild-hall.  Here  Shakespeare  went  to  school, 
and  saw  companies  of  strolling  players  in  the  hall  below.  The  lower  picture  shows 
the  grammar-school  room  after  its  "restoration,"  in  1892. 


Cy\y<^ 


RESULTS  AMONG  ANGLICANS  171 


tion,  and  hence  the  need  of  all  being  taught  to  read,  made  scarcely 
any  impression  in  England.  ] 

(  By  the  time  of  Elizabeth'(i558-i6o3)  it  had  become  a  settled 
conviction  with  the  English  as  a  people  that  the  provision  of  edu- 
cation was  a  matter  for  the  Church,  and  was  no  business  of  the 
State,  and^  this  attitude  continued  until  well  into  the  nineteenth 
century.'  -The  English  Church  merely  succeeded  the  Roman 
Church  in  the  control  of  education,  and  now  licensed  the  teach- 
ers (R.  168),  took  their  oath  of  allegiance  (R.  167),  supervised 
prayers  (R.  169)  and  the  instruction',  and  became  very  strict  as 
to  confomjity  to  the  new  faith  (Rs.  164-166),  while  the  schools, 
aside  from  the  private  tuition  and  endowed  schools,  continued  to 
be  maintained^cl^iefly  from  religioussources,  charitable  funds, 
and  tuition  fees^  /  Private  tuition  schools  in  time  flourished,  and 
the  tutor  in  tKe  home  became  the  rule  with  families  of  means.  ^ 
V  The  poorer  people  largely  did  without  schooling,  as  they  had  done' 
for  centuries  before^,,.  As  a  consequence,  the  educational  results 
of  the  change  in  the  headship  of  the  Church  relate  almost  entirely 
to  grammar  schools  and  to  the  universities,  and  not  to  .elementary 
education?)  The  development  of  anything  approaching  a  system 
of  elementary  schools  for  England  was  consequently  left  for 
the  educational  awakening  of  the  latter  half  of  the  nineteenth 
century^  ( When  this  finally  came  the  development  was  due  to 
political  and  economic,  and  not  to  religious  causes^  ^•'^ 

Result  of  the  Reformation  in  England.  The  result  of  the 
change  in  religious  allegiance  in  England  was  a  material  decrease^ 
in  the  number  of  places  offering  grammar-school  advantages, 
though  with  a  material  improvement  in  the  quality  of  the  instruc- 
tion provided,  and  a  consequent  decrease  in  the  number  of  boys 
given  free  education  in  the  refounded  grammar  schools?)  As  for 
elementary  education,  the  abolition  of  the  song,  chantry^  and 
hospital  schools  took  away  most  of  the  elementary  schoolsj^hich 
had  dnceexisted.J  The  clerk  of  the  parish  usually  replaced  them 
by  teaching  a  certain  number  of  boys  "to  read  English  inteliL- 
gently  instead  of  Latin  unintelligently,"  many  new  parish  ele- 
mentary schools  were  'created,  especially  during  the  reign  of 
Elizabeth,  and  in  time  the  dame  school,  the  charity  school,  the 
writing  school,  and  apprenticeship  training  arose  (chapter  xviii) 
and  became  regular  English  institutions)  These  types  of  school- 
ing constituted  almost  all  the  elementai^^-school  advantages  pro- 
vided in  England  until  well  into  the  eighteenth  century .\ 


172       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

The  dominating  religious  purpose.  The  religious  conflicts  fol- 
lowing the  reformation  movement  everywhere  intensified  reli- 
gious prejudices  and  stimulated  religious  bigotry/^  This  was  soon 
reflected  in  the  schools  of  all  lands. '  In  England,  after  the  resto- 
ration under  Catholic  Mary  (1553-58)  and  the  final  reestablish- 
ment  of  the  English  Church  under  Elizabeth  (1558),  all  school 
instruction  became  narrowly  religious  and  English  Protestant  in 
type.  By  the  middle  of  the  seventeenth  century  the  grammar 
schools  had  become  nurseries  of  the  faitW  as  well  as  very  formal 
and  disciplinary  in  charactei:.  In  Englafid,  perhaps  more  than  in 
any  other  Protestant  country,  Christianity  came  to  be  identified 
with  a  strict  conformity  to  the  teachings  and  practices  of  the 
EstabUshed  Church",  and  to  teach  that  particular  faith  became 
one  of  the  particular  missions  of  all  types  of  schools^  Bishops 
were  instructed  to  hunt  out  schoolmasters  who  were  unsound  in 
the  faith  (R.  164  a),  and  teachers  were  deprived  of  their  positions 
for  nonconformity  (R.  164  b).  J;  More  effectively  to  handle  the 
problem  a  series  of  laws  were  enacted,  the  result  of  which  was  to 
institute  such  an  inquisitorial  poliQ^  that  the  position  of  school- 
master became  almost  intolerable.  ;\  In  1580  a  law  (R.  165)  im- 
posed a  fine  of  £10  on  any  one '^employing  a  schoolmaster  of 
unsound  faith^Nwith  disability  and  imprisonment  for  the  school- 
master so  offending])  in  1603  another  law  required  a  license  from 
the  bishop  on  the  ^i't  of  all  schoolmasters  as  a  condition  prece- 
dent to  teaching;  in  1662  the  obnoxious  Act  of  Uniformity  (R.  166) 
required  every  schoolmaster  in  any  type  of  school,  and  all  private 
tutors,  to  subscribe  to  a  declaration  that  they  would  conform  to 
the  liturgy  of  the  Church;  as  established  by  law,  with  fine  and 
imprisonment  for  breaking  the  law;  in  1665  the  so-called  "  Five- 
Mile  Act ')  forbade  Dissenters  to  teach  in  any  school,  under  pen- 
alty of  a  fine  of  £40;  and  in  that  same  year  bishops  were  instructed 
to  see  that 

the  said  schoolmasters,  ushers,  schoolmistresses,  and  instructors,  or 
teachers  of  youth,  publicly  or  privately,  do  themselves  frequent  the 
public  prayers  of  the  Church,  and  cause  their  scholars  to  do  the  same; 
and  whether  they  appear  well  affected  to  the  Government  of  his 
Majesty,  and  the  doctrine  and  discipline  of  the  Church  of  England.^ 

This  attitude  also  extended  upward  to  the  universities  as  well, 
where  nonconformists  were  prohibited  by  law  (1558)  from  re- 
ceiving degrees,  a  condition  that  was  not  remedied  until  1869. 
The  great  purpose  of  instruction  came  to  be  to  support  the 


RESULTS  AMONG  ANGLICANS  173 

authority  and  the  rule  of  the  Established  Church^and  the  ahnost 
complete  purpose  of  elementary  instruction  came  to  be  to  train 
pupils  to  read  the  Catechism,  the  Prayer  Book,  and  the  Bible. 
This  intense  religious  attitude  in  England  was  reflected  in  ear^ 
colonial  America,  as  we  shall  see  in  a  following  chapter. 

QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

-  1.  Why  is  progress  that  is  substantial  nearly  always  a  product  of  slow  rather 
than  rapid  evolution? 

2.  Show  why  the  evolution  of  many  Protestant  sects  was  a  natural  conse- 
quence of  the  position  assumed  by  Luther.  What  is  the  ultimate  out- 
come of  the  process?         .  .        -  ,  .  * ''  -  v . 

3.  Why  was  it  not  important  that 'more  than  a  few  be  educated  imder  the 
older  theory  of  salvation? 

4.  Show  how  modern  democratic  government  was  a  natural  consequence  of 
the  Protestant  position.  ] 

5.  Why  was  universal  education  involved  as  a  later  but  iiltimate  conse- 
quence of  the  position  taken  by  the  Protestants? 

6.  Explain  why  the  local  Church  authorities,  before  1520,  tried  so  hard  to 
prevent  the  estabUshment  of  vernacular  schools. 

7.  Explain  why  the  rehgious  discussions  of  the  Reformation  should  have 
^     so  strongly  stimulated  a  desire  to  read. 

8.  Explain  the  fixing  in  character  of  the  German,  French,  and  EngUsh  lan- 
guages by  a  single  book.     What  had  fixed  the  Itahan?  I  . 

9.  Was  Luther  probably  right  when  he  wrote,  in  1524,  that  the  schools 
"were  deteriorating  throughout  Germany"?    Why? 

10.  Give  reasons  why  Luther's  appeals  for  schools  were  not  more  frmtful. 

11.  What  was  the  significance  of  the  position  of  Luther  for  the  futvure  educa- 
tion of  girls? 

12.  Was  Luther's  idea  that  a  clergyman  should  have  had  some  experience  as 
a  teacher  a  good  one,  or  not?    Why? 

13.  How  do  you  explain  Luther's  ideas  as  to  coupling  up  ejementary  and 
trade  education  in  his  primary  schools?  >.  v  "i-.-,  -  ■.  '  ■  ^    =    „  • 

14.  Point  out  the  similarity  of  Luther's  scheme  for  a  school  system  with  the 
German  school  system  as  finally  evolved  (Figure  36). 

15.  Explain  why  the  Lutheran  idea  of  personal  responsibility  for  salvation 
made  so  little  headway  in  England,  and  show  that  the  natural  educa- 
tional consequences  of  this  resulted. 

16.  Show  what  different  conditions  were  likely  to  follow,  in  later  centuries, 
from  the  different  stands  taken  as  to  the  relation  of  the  State  and  Church 
to  education  by  the  German  people  by  the  middle  of  the  sixteenth 
century,  and  by  the  EngUsh  at  the  time  of  EUzabeth. 

17.  Compare  the  origin  of  the  vemaciUar  elementary-school  teacher  in 
Germany  and  England. 

18.  Leach  estimates  that,  in  1546,  there  were  approximately  three  hundred 
grammar  schools  in  England  for  a  total  population  of  approximately 
two  and  one  half  millions.  About  what  opportunities  for  grammar- 
school  education  did  this  afford? 


174       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  selections  are  repro- 
duced: 

154.  Rashdall:  Diffusion  of  Education  in  Mediaeval  Times. 

155.  Times:  The  Vernacular  Style  of  the  Translation  of  the  Bible. 

156.  Luther:  To  the  Mayors  and  Magistrates  of  Germany. 

157.  Luther:  Dignity  and  Importance  of  the  Teacher's  Work. 

158.  Luther:  On  the  Duty  of  Compelling  School  Attendance. 

159.  Hamburg:  An  Example  of  a  Lutheran  Kirchenordnung. 

160.  Brieg:  An  Example  of  a  Lutheran  Schuleordnung. 

161.  Melanchthon:  The  Saxony  School  Plan. 

162.  Raumer:  The  School  System  Established  in  Wiirtemberg. 

163.  Duke  Ernest:  The  5cAw/ewe/^oJM5  for  Gotha. 

164.  Strype:  The  Supervision  of  a  Teacher's  Acts  and  Religious  BeUefs 
in  England. 

(o)  Letter  of  Queen's  Council  on. 

{b).  Dismissal  of  a  Teacher  for  non-conformity, 

165.  Elizabeth:  Penalties  on  Non-conforming  Schoolmasters. 

166.  Statutes:  English  Act  of  Uniformity  of  1662. 

167.  Carlisle:  Oath  of  a  Grammar  School  Master. 

168.  Strype:  An  English  Elementary-School  Teacher's  License. 
/    169.  Cowper:  Grammar  School  Statutes  regarding  Prayers. 

170.  Green:  Effect  of  the  Translation  of  the  Bible  into  English. 

171.  Old  MS.:  Ignorance  of  the  Monks  at  Canterbury  and  Messenden. 

172.  Parker:  Refounding  of  the  Cathedral  School  at  Canterbury. 

173.  NichoUs:  Origin  of  the  English  Poor-Law  of  1601. 

174.  Statutes:  The  English  Poor  Law  of  1601. 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

*Adams,  G.  B.    Civilization  during  the  Middle  Ages. 

Barnard,  Henry.    German  Teachers  and  Educators. 

Francke,  Kuno.     Social  Forces  in  German  Literature. 
*Good,  Harry  E.     "The  Position  of  Luther  upon  Education,"  in  School 

and  Society,  vol.  6,  pp.  511-18  (Nov.  3,  191 7). 
*Montmorency,  J.  E.  G.  de.    State  Intervention  in  English  Education. 
*Montmorency,  J.  E.  G.  de.     The  Progress  of  Education  in  England. 

Painter,  F.  V.  N.     Luther  on  Education. 

Paulsen,  Fr.     German  Education. 

Richard,  J.  W.    Philipp  Melanchthon,  the  Protestant  Preceptor  of  Germany. 
.  Woodward,  W.  H.    Education  during  the  Renaissance. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

EDUCATIONAL  RESULTS  OF  THE  PROTESTANT 
REVOLTS . 

II.  AMONG  CALVINISTS  AND  CATHOLICS 

3.  Educational  work  of  the  Calvinists 
The  organizing  work  of  Calvin.  From  the  point  of  view  of 
American  educational  history  the  most  important  developments 
in  connection  with  the  Reformation  were  those  arising  from 
Calvinism.  While  the  Calvinistic  faith  was  rather  grim  and  for- 
bidding, viewed  from  the  modern  standpoint,  (^  the  Calvinists 
everywhere  had  a  program  for  poHtisal,  economic,  and  social 
progress  which  has  left  a  deep  impress  on  the  history  of  mankind  J 
This  program  demanded  the  education  of  all,  and  in  the  countries 
where  Calvinism  became  dominant  the  leaders  included  general 
education  in  their  scheme  of  religious,  poHtical,  and  social  re- 
form. In  the  governmental  program  which  Calvin  drew  up 
(1537)  for  the  religious  republic  at  Geneva  (p.  159),  he  held  that 
learning  was  "a  public  necessity  to  secure  good  political  adminis- 
tration, sustain  the  Church  unharmed,  and  maintain  humanity 
among  men." 

\  In  his  plan  for  the  schools  of  Geneva,  published  in  1538,  he  out- 
lined a  system  of  elementary  education  in  the  vernacular  for  all/ 
which  involved  instruction  in  reading,  writing,  arithmetic,  reli- 
gion, careful  grammatical  drill,  and  training  for  civil  as  well  as 
for  ecclesicistical  leadership.  In  his  plan  of  154 1  he  upholds  the 
principle,  as  had  Luther,  that  "the  liberal  arts  and  good  training 
are  aids  to  a  full  knowledge  of  the  Word."  This  involved  the 
organization  of  secondary  schools,  or  colleges  as  he  called  them, 
following  the  French  nomenclature,  to  prepare  leaders  for  the 
ministry  and  the  civil  government  through  "instruction  in  the 
languages  and  humane  science."  In  the  colleges  (secondary 
schools)  which  he  organized  at  Geneva  and  in  neighboring  places 
to  give  such  training,  and  which  became  models  of  their  kind 
which  were  widely  copied,  the  usual  humanistic  curriculum  was 
combined  with  intensive  religious  instruction^  These  colleges 
became  famous  as  institutions  from  which  learned  men  came 
forth.     The  course  of  study  in  the  seven  classes  of  one  of  the 


176        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

Geneva  colleges,  which  has  been  nyeserved  for  us,  reveals  the  na- 
ture of  the  instruction  (R.  175).  I  The  men  who  went  forth  from 
the  colleges  of  Geneva  to  teach  and  to  preach  the  Calvinistic  gos- 
pel were  numbered  by  the  hundreds. 

The  world  owes  much  to  the  constructive,  statesman-like  gen- 
ius of  Calvin  and  those  who  followed  him,  and  we  in  America 
probably  most  of  all. '.,  Geneva  became  a  refuge  for  the  persecuted 
Protestants  from  other  lands,  and  through  such  influences  the 
ideas  of  Calvin  spread  to  the  Huguenots  in  France,  the  Walloons 
of  the  Dutch  and  Belgian  Netherlands,  the  Germans  in  the  Pa- 
latinate, the  Presbyterians  of  Scotland,  the  Puritans  in  England, 
and  later  to  the  American  colonies. 

Calvinism  in  other  lands.  The  great  educational  work  done  by 
the  Calvinists  in  France,  in  the  face  of  heavy  persecution,  de- 
serves to  be  ranked  with  that  of  the  Lutherans  in  Germany  in  its 
importance.  Had  the  Calvinists  had  the  same  opportunity  for 
free  development  the  Lutherans  had,  and  especially  their  state 
support,  there  can  be  little  doubt  that  their  work  would  have 
greatly  exceeded  the  Lutherans  in  importance  and  influence  on 
the  future  history  of  mankind. 

True  to  the  Calvinistic  teaching  of  putting  principles  into 
practice,  they  organized  an  extensive  system  of  schools,  extending 
from  elementary  education  for  all,  through  secondary  schools  or 
colleges,  up  to  eight  Huguenot  universities.';  As  a  people  they 
were  thrifty  and  capable  of  making  great  sacrifices  to  carry  out 
their  educational  ideals.,  The  education  they  provided  was  not 
only  religious  but  civil;  not  only  intellectual  but  moral,  social, 
and  economic.  Education  was  for  all,  rich  and  poor  aUke.  Their 
sjmods  made  liberal  appropriations  for  the  universities^  while 
municipalities  provided  for  colleges  and  elementary  education.^ 
They  emphasized,  in  the  lower  schools,  the  study  of  the  vemacu^ 
lar  and  arithmetic,  and  in  the  colleges  Greek  and  the  New  Testa- 
ment. •  The  long  Hst  of  famous  teachers  found  in  their  universi- 
ties reveals  the  character  of  their  instruction. 

In  the  Palatinate  (see  map,  Figure  33)  some  progress  in  found- 
ing churches  and  schools  was  made,  especially  about  Strassburg^ 
and  the  universities  of  Heidelberg  and  Marburg  became  the  cen- 
ters of  Huguenot  teaching.  In  the  Dutch  Netherlands,  and  in 
that  part  of  the  Belgian  Netherlands  inhabited  by  the  Walloons, 
Calvinist  ideas  as  to  education  dominated.  The  universities  of 
Leyden  (f.  1575),  Groningen  (f.  1614),  Amsterdam  (f.  1630),  and 


RESULTS  AMONG  CALVINISTS 


177 


Utrecht  (f.  1636)  were  Calvinistic,  and  closely  in  touch  with  the 
Calvinists  and  Huguenots  of  German  lands  and  France.  Popu- 
lar education  was  looked  after  among  these  people  as  it  was  in 
Calvinistic  France  and  Geneva.^  The  Church  Synod  of  The 
Hague  (1586)  ordered  the  establishment  of  schools  in  the  cities, 

and  in  1618  the  Great  Synod  held  at  Dort  (R.  176)  ordered  that: 

f 

"^  Schools  in  which  the  young  shall  be  properly  instructed  in  piety  and 
fundamentals  of  Christian  doctrine  shall  be  instituted  not  only  in  cities,  but 
also  in  towns  and  country  places  where  heretofore  none  have  existed.  The 
Christian  magistracy  shall  be  requested  that  honorable  stipends  Ve  pro- 
vided for  teachers,  and  that  well-qualified  persons  may  be  employed  and 
enabled  to  devote  themselves  to  that  function;  and  especially  that  the 
children  of  the  poor  may  be  gratuitously  instructed  by  them  and  not  be 
excluded  from  the  benefits  of  schools. 


^. 


^ 


•"urther  provisions  were  made  as  to  the  certificating  of  school- 
masters, and  the  pastors  were  made  superintendents  of  the 
schools,  to  visit,  exam- 
ine, encourage,  advise, 
and  report  1  (R.  176). 
L  Provision  for  the  free 
education  of  the  poor 
became  common,  and 
elementary  education 
was  made  accessible  to 
aU.  j  The  careful  pro- 
vision for  education 
made  by  the  province 
of  Utrecht  ( 1 590 , 1 6 1 2) 
(R.I 78)  was  typical  of 
Dutch  activity.. ''  The 
province  of  Drenthe 
ordered  (1630)  a  school 
tax  paid  for  aU  chil- 
dren over  seven, 
whether  attending 
school  or  not.  The 
province  of  Overyssel 
levied  (1666)  a  school 
tax  for   all    children 

from  eight  to  twelve  years  of  age.  The  province  of  Gromngei; 
constituted  the  pastors  the  attendance  officers  to  see  that  the 
children  got  to  school.    Amsterdam  and  many  other  Dutch  cities 


Fig.  37.  A  Dutch  Village  School 

(After  a  painting  by  Adrian  Ostade,  dated  1662, 
now  in  the  Louvre,  at  Paris) 


178        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

demanded  an  examination  of  all  teachers  before  being  licensed  to 
teach.  By  the  middle  of  the  seventeenth  century-a  good  system 
of  schools  seems  to  have  been  provided  generally  by  the  Dutch 
and  the  Belgian  Walloons  (R.  178).  That  the  teaching  of  religion 
was  the  main  function  of  the  Dutch  elementary  schools,  as  of 
all  other  vernacular  schools  of  the  time,  is  seen  from  the  official 
lists  of  the  textbooks  used  (R.  178).  ) 

John  Knox,  the  leader  of  the  Scottish  Reformation  (1560),  who 
had  spent  some  time  at  Geneva  and  who  was  deeply  impressed  by 
the  Calvinistic  religious-state  found  there,  introduced  the  Calvin- 
istic  religious  and  educational  ideas  into  Scotland.  ,  The  edu- 
cational plan  proposed  by  Knox  would  have  called  foi'  a  large  ex- 
penditure of  money,  and  this  the  thrifty  Scotch  were  not  ready 
for.  Knox  and  his  followers  then  proposed  to  endow  the  new 
schools  from  the  old  church  and  monastic  foundations,  but  the 
Scottish  nobles  hoped  to  share  in  these,  as  had  the  English  no- 
bility under  Henry  VIII,  and  Knox's  plan  was  not  approved. 
This  delayed  the  establishment  of  a  real  national  system  of  edu- 
cation for  Scotland  until  the  nineteenth  century'T)  The  new 
Church,  however,  took  over  the  superintendence  ofeducation  in 
Scotland,  and  when  parish  schools  were  finally  established  by 
decree  of  the  Privy  Council,  in  1616,  and  by  the  legislation  of 
1633  and  1646  (R.  179),  the  Church  was  given  an  important 
share  in  their  organization  and  management.  These  schools^ 
while  not  always  sufficient  in  number  to  meet  the  educational 
needs,  were  well  taught,  and  have  deeply  influenced  the  national 
character. 

4.  The  Counter-Reformation  of  the  Catholics 

The  Jesuit  Order.  (The  Protestant  Revolt  made  but  little 
headway  in  Italy,  Spain,  Portugal,  much  of  France,  or  southern 
Belgium  j(see  map,  p.  157).  Italy  was  scarcely  disturbed  at  all, 
while  in'France,  where  of  all  these  countries  the  reform  ideas  had 
made  greatest  progress,  nine  tenths  of  the  people  remained  loyal 
to  Rome. 3  In  a  general  way  it  may  be  stated  that  those  parts  of 
western  Europe  which  had  once  formed  an  integral  part  of  the  old 
Roman  Empire  remained  loyal  to  the  Roman  Church,  while  those 
which  had  been  the  homes  of  the  Germanic  tribes  revolted.  >/ Now 
it  naturally  happened  that  the  countries  which  remained  loyal  to 
the  old  Church  experienced  none  of  the  feelings  of  the  necessity 
for  education  as  a  means  to  personal  salvation  which  the  Luther- 


COUNTER-REFORMATION  OF  CATHOLICS     179 

ans  and  Calvinists  felt.  )  There,  too,  the  church  system  of  educa- 
tion which  had  develofJed  during  the^long  Middle  Ages  remained 
undisturbed  and  largely  unchanged^  The  Church  as  an  institu- 
tion, though,  learned  from  the  Protestants  the  value  of  education 
as  a  means  to  larger  ends,  and  soon  set  about  using  it. 

After  the  Church  Council  of  Trent  (1545-63),  where  definite 
church  reform  measures  were  carried  through  (p.  161),  the  Catho- 
lics inaugurated  what  has  since  been  called  a  counter-reforma- 
tion, W  an  effort  to  hold  lands  which  were  still  loyal  and  to  win 
baCK  lands  which  had  been  lostT;  Besides  reforming  the  practices 
and  outward  Hves  of  the  churchmen,  and  reforming  some  church 
practices  and  methods,  the  Church  inaugurated  a  campaign  of    :< 
educational  propaganda  J    In  this  last  the  chief  reliance  was  upon    x^ 
a  new  and  a  very  useful  organization  officially  known  as  the  "  So-     '^^ 
ciety  of  Jesus,"  but  more  commonly  called  the  ''Jesuit  Order." 

V  This  order  was  organized  along  strictly  military  lines,  all  mem-    n,    ^ 
bers  being  responsible  to  its  General,  and  he  in  turn  alone  to  the     s^^  ' 
Pope.  jt/The  quiet  life  of  the  cloister  was  abandoned  for  a  life     >    ^ 
of  open  warfare  under  a  military  discipline!     The  Jesuit  was  to    ^^ 
live  in  the  world,  and  all  peculiarities  of  dr^ss  or  rule  which  might  ,^ 
prove  an  obstacle  to  worldly  success  were  suppressed.     The  pur-   ,>* 
poses  of  the  Order  were  to  combat  heresy,  and  to  strengthen  the   Ti^ 
authority  of  the  Papac)^>  Its  foimder  was 
Ignatius  de  Loyola.     Its  motto  was  Omnia 

ad  Majorem  Dei  Gloriam  (that  is,  All  for  the         ^iir'iTillTil^       t  'j. 
greater  glory  of  God),  and  the  means  to  be        >^i«3l^HHB      ~^ 
employed  by  it  to  accomplish  these  ends 
were  the  piilpit,  the  confessional,  the  niis- 
si.Qll,  and  the  school.     Of  these  the  school         ___^______ 

was  given  the  place  of  first  importance?^)      ^^^SB^^^^k   t\^ 

(Realizing  clearly  that  the  real  cause  of  the  ^  '^^ 

Reformation  had  been  the  ignorance,  neg- 
lect, and  vicious  Hves  of  so  many  monks 
and  priests  and  the  extortion  and  neglect 

practiced  by  the  Church,  Ind  that  the  chief    Fig-  38.  Ignatius  de      0  ^ 

!•«-     1  •    .1     i  .  1        1  r      ^u         Loyola  (1491-1556)     ~>  > 

difl&culty  was  m  the  higher  places  of  author-  ^  ^^      ^''  '     ^  ^ 

ity,  it  became  the  prime  principle  of  the  Order  to  live  upright  ^  ^ 
and  industrious  lives  themselves,  and  to  try  to  reach  and  train  ^  > 
those  likely  to  be  the  future  leaders  in  Church  and  StateT)  With 
the  education  of  the  masses  of  the  people  the  Order  was  not  ^  . 
coQcerned.,  Our  interest  lies  only  with  the  educational  work  of  -^^  \ 
J  4  ^ 


i8o       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

this  Order,  a  work  in  which  it  was  remarkably  successful  and 
through  which  it  exercised  a  very  large  influence.^^ 

Great  success  of  the  Order.  The  service  of  the  Order  to  the 
Church  in  combating  Protestant  heresies  was  very  marked.  They 
did  much,  single-handed,  to  roll  back  the  tide  of  Protestantism 
which  had  advanced  over  half  of  western  Europe,  and  to  hold 
other  countries  true  to  the  ancient  faith. 

The  colleges  were  usually  large  and  well-supported  institutions^ 
with  dormitories,  classrooms,  dining-halls,  and  playgrounds."^ 
The  usual  number  of  scholars  in  each  was  about  300,  though 
some  had  an  attendance  of  600  to  800,  and  a  few  as  high  as 
2000.  At  their  period  of  maximum  influence  the  colleges  and 
universities  of  the  Order  probably  enrolled  a  total  of  200,000 
students.  Their  graduates  were  prominent  in  every  scholarly 
and  governmental  activity  of  the  time.""'  As  far  as  possible  the 
pupils  were  a  selected  class  to  whom  the  Order  offered  free  in- 
struction. I  The  children  of  the  nobility  and  gentry,  and  the 
brightest  and  most  promising  youths  of  the  different  lands  were 
drawn  into  their  schools.  The  children  of  many  .Protestants, 
also,  were  attracted  by  the  high  quality  of  the  instruction  offered?^ 
There  they  were  given  the  best  secondary-school  education  of  the 
time,  and  received,  at  an  impressionable  age,  the  peculiar  Jesuit 
stamp.  Knowing  very  well  why  they  were  at  work  and  what 
ends  they  should  achieve,  intolerant  of  opposition,  intensely 
practical  in  all  their  work,  and  possessed  of  an  indefatigable  zeal 
in  the  accomplishment  of  their  purpose,  they  gave  Europe  in  gen- 
eral and  northern  continental  Europe  in  particular  a  system  of 
secondary  schools  and  universities  possessed  of  a  high  degree  of 
effectiveness,  which,  combined  with  religious  warfare  and  perse- 
cution, in  time  drove  out  or  dwarfed  all  competing  institutions  in 
the  countries  they  were  able  to  control. 

Jesuit  school  methods.  The  characteristic  method  of  the 
schools  was  oral,  with  a  consequent  closeness  of  contact  of  teacher 
and  pupils. ,  This  closeness  of  contact  and  sympathy  was  further 
retained  by  the  system  whereby  all  ^punishment  was  given  by  the 
official  Corrector  of  the  institution.  Their  method,  like  that  of 
the  modern  German  Volkschule,  was  distinctly  a  teaching  and 
not  a  questioning  method.  The  teacher  planned  and  gave  the 
instruction;  the  pupils  received  it.  The  memory  was  drilled; 
but  little  training  of  the  judgment  or  understanding  was  given. 
Thoroughness,  memory  drills,  and  the  disciplinary  value  of  stud- 


COUNTER-REFORMATION  OF  CATHOLICS     i8i 

ies  were  foundation  stones  in  the  Jesuit's  educational  theory?) 
Repetition,  they  said,  was  the  mother  of  memory.  Each  day  the^ 
work  of  the  previous  day  was  reviewed,  and  there  were  further 
reviews  at  the  end  of  each  week,  month,  and  year^) 
(To  retain  the  interest  of  the  pupils  amid  such  a  load  of  memoriz- 
ing, various  school  devices  were  resorted  to,  chief  among  which 
were  prizes,  ranks,  emulations,  rivals,  and  public  disputations^ 
V^The  system  of  rivals,  whereby  each  boy  had  an  opponent  seatea 
opposite  and  constantly  after  him  was  one  of  the  peculiar 
features  of  their  schools.  While  the  schools  were  said  to  have 
been  made  pleasant  and  attractive,  the  idea  of  the  absolute  au- 
thority of  the  Church  which  they  represented  pervaded  them  and 
repressed  the  development  of  that  individuality  which  the  court 
schools  of  the  Italian  Renaissance,  the  schools  of  the  northern 
humanists,  and  the  Calvinistic  colleges  had  tried  particularly  to 
foster.")  This,  however,  is  a  criticism  made  from  a  modern  point 
of  view.  That  the  school  represented  well  the  spirit  of  the  times 
is  indicated  by  their  marked  success  as  teaching  institutions. ; 

Training  of  the  Jesuit  teacher.  The  newest  and  the  most  dis- 
tinguishing feature  of  the  Jesuit  educational  scheme,  as  well  as 
the  most  important,  was  the  care  with  which  they  selected  and 
the  thoroughness  with  which  they  trained  their  teachers^  To  be- 
gin with,  every  Jesuit  was  a  picked  man,  and  of  those  wHo  entered 
the  Order  only  the  best  were  selected  for  teachingT)  Each  entered 
the  Order  for  life^  was  vowed  to  celibacy,  poverty,  chastity,  up- 
rightness of  life,  and  absolute  obedience  to  the  commands  of  the 
Order.  The  six-year  inferior  course  had  to  be  completed,  which 
required  that  the  boy  be  sixteen  to  eighteen  years^bf  age  before  he 
could  take  the  preliminarjr  steps  toward  joining  the  Order,!  Then 
a  two-year  novitiate,  away  from  the  world,  followed.  This  was  a 
trial  of  his  real  character,  his  weak  points  were  note^,  and  his  will 
and  determination  tested.  Many  were  dismissed  before  the  end 
of  the  novitiate.  If  retained  and  accepted,  he  took  the  prelimi- 
nary vows  and  entered  the  philosophical  course  of  study.  On 
completing  this  he  was  from  twenty-one  to  twenty-three  years  of 
age.  He  was  now  assigned  to  teach  boys  in  the  inferior  classes  of 
some  college,  and  might  remain  there.\  If  destined  for  higher 
work  he  taught  in  the  inferior  classes  for  two  or  three  years,  and 
then  entered  the  theological  course  at  some  Josuit  university. 
This  required  four  years  for  those  headed  for  the  ministry-,  and  six 
for  those  who  were  being  trained  for  professorships  in  the  col- 


1 82       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

leges.  On  completing  this  course  the  final  vows  were  taken,  at  an 
age  of  from  twenty^nine  to  thirty- two.  The  training  to-day  is 
still  longer.  To  become  a  teacher  in  the  inferior  classes  required 
training  until  twenty-one  at  least,  and  for  college  (secondary) 
classes  training  until  at  least  twenty-nine.  The  training  was  in 
scholarship,  religion,  theology,  and  an  apprenticeship  in  teaching, 
and  was  superior  to  that  required  for  a  teaching  license  in  any 
Protestant  country  of  Europe,  or  in  the  Catholic  Church  itself 
outside  of  the  Jesuit  Order. 

With  such  carefully  selected  and  well-educated  teachers,  them- 
selves models  of  upright  life  in  an  age  when  priests  and  monks 
had  been  careless,  it  is  not  surprising  that  they  wielded  an  influ- 
ence wholly  out  of  proportion  to  their  numbers,  and  supplied 
Europe  with  its  best  secondary  schools  during  the  seventeeriih. 
and  early  eighteenth  centuries.  In  the  loyal  Catholic  countries 
they  were  virtually  the  first  secondary  schools  outside  of  the  mon- 
asteries and  churches,  and  the  real  introduction  of  humanism  into 
Spain,  Portugal,  and  parts  of  France  came  with  the  establish- 
ment of  the  Jesuit  humanistic  colleges.  For  their  schools  they 
wrote  new  school  books  —  the  Protestant  books,  the  most  cele- 
brated of  which  were  those  of  Erasmus,  Melanchthon,  Sturm,  and 
Lily,  were  not  possible  of  use  —  and  for  a  time  they  put  new  life 
into  the  humanistic  type  of  education.  Before  the  eighteenth 
century,  however,  their  secondary  schools  had  become  as  formal 
as  had  those  in  Protestant  lands  (R.  146),  and  their  universities 
far  more  narrow  and  intolerant. 

The  Church  and  elementary  education.  As  was  stated  on  a 
preceding  page,  the  countries  which  remained  loyal  to  the  Church 
experienced  none  of  the  Protestant  feeling  as  to  the  necessity  for 
universal  education  for  indiyidual  salvation.  In  such  lands  the 
church  system  of  education  which  had  grown  up  during  the 
Middle  Ages  remained  undisturbed,  and  was  expanded  but  slowly 
with  the  passage  of  time.  The  Church,  never  having  made  gen- 
eral provision  for  education,  was  not  prepared  for  such  wor2>) 
Teachers  were  scarce,  there  was  no  theory  of  education  except 
the  religious  theory,  and  few  knew  what  to  do  or  how  to  do  iL 
Many  churchmen,  too,  did  not  see  the  need  for  doing  anything,  y 
Nevertheless  the  Church,  spurred  on  by  the  new  demands  of  a 
world  fast  becoming  modern,  and  by  the  exhortations  of  the 
official  representatives  of  the  people,  now  began  to  make  extra 
efforts,  in  the  large  cathedral  cities,  to  remedy  the  deficiency  of 
more  than  a  thousand  years. 


COUxNTER-REFORMATION  OF  CATHOLICS     183 

The  general  effect  of  the  Reformation,  though,  was  to  stimu- 
late the  Church  to  greater  activity  in  elementary,  as  well  as  in 
secondary  and  higher  education.  In  the  sSteenth  and  seven- 
teenth centuries  we  find  a  large  number  of  decrees  by  church 
councils  and  exhortations  by  bishops  urging  the  extension  of  the 
existing  church  system  of  education,  so  as  to  supply  at  least  reli- 
gious training  to  all  the  children  of  the  faithful.  As  a  result  a 
number  of  teaching  orders  were  organized,  the  aim  of  which  was  to 
assist  the  Church  in  providing  elementary  and  religious  education 
for  the  children  of  the  laboring  and  artisan  classes  in  the  cities. 

The  Brothers  of  the  Christian  Schools.  The  largest  and  most 
influential  of  the.  teaching  orders  established  for  elementary  edu- 
cation was  the  "Institute  of  the  Brothers  of  the  Christian 
Schools,^  founded  by  Father  La  Salle  at  Rouen,  in  1684,  and  sanc- 
tioned uy  the  King  and  Pope  in  1724.  As  early  as  1679  La  Salle 
had  begun  a  school  at  Rheims,  and  in  1684  he  organized  his  disci- 
ples, prescribed  a  costume  to  be  worn,  and  outUned  the  work  of 
the  brotherhood  (R.  182).  The  object  was  to  provide  free_ele-, 
mentary  and  religious  instruction  in  the  vernacular  for  the  chil- 
dren of  the  working  classes,  and  to  do  for  elementary  education 
what  the  Jesuits  had  done  for  secondary  education.  La  Salle's 
Conduct  of  Schools,  first  published  in  1720,  was  the  ratio  studiorum 
of  his  order.  His  work  marks  the  real  beginning  of  free  primary 
instruction  in  the  vernacular  in  France.  In  addition  to  elemen- 
tary schools,  a  few  of  what  we  should  call  part-tune  continuation 
schools  were  organized  for  children  engaged  in  commerce  and 
industry.  Realizing  better  than  the  Jesuits  the  need  for  well- 
trained  rather  than  highly  educated  teachers  for  httle  children, 
and  unable  to  supply  members  to  meet  the  outside  calls  for 
schools.  La  Salle  organized  at  Rheims,  m  1685,  what  was  prob- 
ably the  second  normal  school  for  training  teachers  in  the  world. 
Another  was  organized  later  at  Paris.  In  addition  to  a  good  edu- 
cation of  the  type  of  the  time  and  thorough  grounding  in  reUgion, 
the  student  teachers  learned  to  teach  in  practice  schook,  imder 
the  direction  of  experienced  teachers. 

The  pupils  in  La  Salle's  schools  were  graded  into  classes,  and 
the  class  method  of  instruction  was  introduced.  The  curriculum 
was  unusually  rich  for  a  time  when  teaching  methods  and  text- 
books were  but  poorly  developed,  the  needs  for  literary  education 
small,  and  when  children  could  not  as  yet  be  spared  from  work 
longer  than  the  age  of  m'ne  or  ten.    Children  learned  first  to  read, 


1 84        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

write,  and  spell  French,  and  to  do  simple  composition  work  in  the 
vernacular.  Those  who,  mastered  this  easily  were  taught  the 
Latin  Psalter  in  addition.  Much  prominence  was  given  to  writ-  - 
ing,  the  instruction  being  applied  to  the  writing  of  bills,  notes, 
receipts,  and  the  like.  Much  free  questioning  was  allowed  in 
arithmetic  and  the  Catechism,  to  insure  perfect  understanding  of 
what  was  taught.  Religious  training  was  made  the  most  promi- 
nent feature  of  the  school,  as  was  natural.  A  half-hour  daily  was 
given  to  the  Catechism,  mass  was  said  daily,  the  crucifix  was  al- 
ways on  the  wall,  and  two  or  three  pupils  were  always  to  be  found 
kneeling,  telling  their  beads.  The  discipline,  in  contradistinction 
to  the  customary  practice  of  the  time,  was  mild,  though  all  pun- 
ishments were  carefuUy  prescribed  by  rule.  The  rule  of  silence 
in  the  school  was  rigidly  enjoined,  all  speech  was  to  be  in  a  low 
tone  of  voice,  and  a  code  of  signals  replaced  speech  for  many 
things. 

Though  the  Order  met  with  much  opposition  from  both  church 
and  civil  authorities,  it  made  slow  but  steady  headway.  At  the 
time  of  the  death  of  La  Salle,  in  17 19,  thirty-five  years  after  its 
foundation,  the  Order  had  one  general  normal  school,  four  normal 
schools  for  training  teachers,  three  practice  schools,  thirty-three 
primary  schools,  and  one  continuation  school.  The  Order  re- 
mained largely  French,  and  at  the  time  of  its  suppression,  in  1792, 
had  schools  in  121  communities  in  France  and  6  elsewhere,  about 
1000  brothers,  and  approximately  30,000  children  in  its  schools. 
This  was  approximately  i  child  in  every  175  of  school  age  of  the 
population  of  France  at  that  time.  While  relatively  small  in 
numbers,  their  schools  represented  the  best  attempt  to  provide 
elementary  education  in  any  Catholic  country  before  well  into 
the  nineteenth  century,     y^ 

5.  General  results  of  the  Reformation  on  education 

Destruction  and  creation  of  schools.  Any  such  general  over- 
turning of  the  established  institutions  and  traditions  of  a  thou- 
sand years  as  occurred  at  the  time  of  the  Protestant  Revolts,  with 
the  accompanying  bitter  hatreds  and  religious  strife,  could  not 
help  but  result  in  extensive  destruction  of  established  institutions. 
Monasteries,  churches,  and  schools  alike  suffered,  and  it  required 
time  to  replace  them.  Even  though  they  had  been  neglectful  of 
their  functions,  inadequate  in  number,  and  unsuited  to  the  needs 
of  a  world  fast  becoming  modern,  they  had  nevertheless  answered 


GENERAL  RESULTS  OF  REFORMATION     185 

•  partially  the  need  of  the  times.  In  all  the  countries  where  revolts 
took  place  these  institutions  suffered  more  or  less,  but  in  England 
probably  most  of  all.  The  old  schools  which  were  not  destroyed 
were  transformed  into  Protestant  schools,  the  grammar  schools 
to  train  scholars  and  leaders,  and  the  parish  schools  into  Protest- 
ant elementary-  schools  to  teach  reading  and  the  Catechism,  but 
the  number  of  the  latter,  in  all  Protestant  lands,  was  very  far 
short  of  the  number  needed  to  carry  out  the  Protestant  religious 
theoryT)  This,  as  we  have  seen,  proposed  to  extend  the  elements 
of  an  education  to  large  and  entirely  new  classes  of  people  who 
never  before  in  the  history  of  the  world  had  had  such  advantages/) 
(  Out  of  the  Protestant  religious  conception  that  all  should  be  edu- 
cated the  popular  elementary  school  of  modern  times  has  been 
evoIved.N  The  evolution,  though,  was  slow,  and  long  periods  of 
time  have  been  required  for  its  accomplishment.  ^ 
\_hi  place  of  the  schools  destroyed,  or  the  teachers  driven  out  if 
no  destruction  took  place,  the  reformers  made  an  earnest  effort 
to  create  new  schools  and  supply  teachers.")  This,  though,  re- 
quired time,  especially  as.  there  was  as  yet  in  the  world  no  body 
of  vernacular  teachersyho  institutions  in  which  such  could  be 
trained  J  no  theory  as  to  education  except  the  religious,  no  supply 
of  educated  men  or  women  from  which  to  draw,  no  theory  of 
state  support  and  control,  and  1^0  source  of  taxation  from  which  to 
derive  asteady  flow  of  funds.  /Throughout  the  long  Middle  Ages 
the  Church  had  supplied  gratuitous  or  nearly  gratuitous  instruc- 
tion^ (This  it  could  do,  to  the  limited  number  whom  it  taught, 
from  the  proceeds  of  its  age-old,, endowments  and  educational 
foundations.;  In  the  process  of  transformation  from  a  Catholic 
to  a  Protestant  State,  and  especially  during  the  more  than  a  cen- 
tury of  turmoil  and  religious  strife  which  followed  the  rupture  of 
the  old  relations,  many  of  the  old  endowments  were  lost  or  were 
diverted  from  their  original  purposes.  As  the  Protestant  reform- 
ers were  supported  generally  by  the  ruling  princes,  many  of  these 
tried  to  remedy  the  deficiency  by  ordering  schools  established.^ 

/The  landed  nobihty  though,  unused  to  providing  education  for^ 
their  villein  tenants  and  serfs,  were  averse  te  supplying  the 
deficiency  by  any  form  of  general  taxation.'^  ( Nor  were  the  rising 
merchant  classes  in  the  cities  any  more  anxious  to  pay  taxes  to 
provide  for  artisans  and  servants  what  had  for  ages  been  a  gra- 
tuity or  not  furnished  at  all. 
No  real  demand  for  elementary  schools.     The  creation  of  a 


1 86       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


largely  new  type  of  schools,  and  in  sufficient  numbers  to  meet  the 
needs  of  large  classes  of  people  who  before  had  never  shared  in 
the  advantages  of  education,  in  consequence  proved  to  be  a  work 
of  centuries.  ^  The  century  of  warfare  which  followed  the  reforma- 


Schools  as  developed  in  the  16th  and  17th  Centuries 


i 


m 


ill 


'0. 


a 


Fig.  39.  Tendencies  in  Educational  Development  in  Europe' 
1500  to  1700 

tion  movement  more  or  less  exhausted  all  Europe,  while  the 
Thirty  Years'  War  which  formed  its  culmination  left  the  German 
States,  where  the  largest  early  educational  progress  had  been 
made,  a  ruin. ;  In  consequence  there  was  for  long  little  money  for 
school  support,  and  religious  interest  and  church  tithes  had  to  be 
depended  on  almost  entirely  for  the  establishment  and  support 
of  schools.  Out  of  the  parish  sextons  or  clerks  a  supply  of  vernac- 
ular teachers  had  to  be  evolved,  a  system  of  school  organization 
and  supervision  worked  out  and  added  to  the  duties  of  the  min- 
ister, and  the  feeUng  of  need  for  education  awakened  sufficiently 
to  make  people  willing  to  support  schools.  In  consequence  what 
Luther  and  Calvin  declared  at  the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth 
century  to  be  a  necessity  for  the  State  and  the  common  right  of 
all,  it  took  until  well  into  the  nineteenth  century  actually  to 
create  and  make  a  reality .j 

The  great  demand  of  the  time,  too,  was  not  so  much  for  the 
education  of  the  masses,  however  desirable  or  even  necessary  this 
might  be  from  the  standpoint  of  Protestant  religious  theory,  but 
for  the  training  of  leaders  for  the  new  religious  and  social  order 
which  the  Revival  of  Learning,  the  rise  of  modern  nationalities, 


GENERAL  RESULTS  OF  REFORIVIATION     187 

and  the  Reformation  movements  had  brought  into  being.  For 
this  secondar>'  schools  for  boys,  largely  Latin  in  type,  were  de- 
manded rather  than  elementary  vernacular  schools  for  both  sexes. 
We  accordingly  find  the  great  creations  of  the  period  were  second- 
ary schools. ' 

Lines  of  future  development  established.  Still  more,  certain 
lines  of  future  development  now  became  clearly  estabUshed.  The 
drawing  given  here  will  help  to  make  this  evident.  It  wUl  be 
seen  from  this  that  not  only  was  the  secondary  school  still  the 
dominant  tyi)e,  though  elementaiy  schools  began  for  the  first 
time  to  be  considered  as  important  also,  but  that  the  secondary 
schools  were  wholly  independent  of  the  elementary  schools  which 
now  began  to  be  created.  -  The  elementary  schools  were  in  the 
vernacular  and  for  the  masses;  the  secondary  schools  were  in  the 
Latin  tongue  and  for  the  training  of  the  scholarly  leaders/)  Be- 
tween these  two  schools,  so  different  in  type  and  in  clientele,  there 
was  little  in  common.  This  difference  was  further  emphasized 
with  time.  The  elementary  schools  later  on  added  subjects  of 
use  to  the  common  people,  while  the  secondary  schools  added 
subjects  of  use  for  scholarly  preparation  or  for  university  entrance. 
The  secondary  schools  also  frequently  provided  preparatory 
schools  for  their  particular  classes  of  children.  As  a  result,  all 
through  Europe  two  school  systems  —  an  elementary-school  sys- 
tem for  the  masses,  and  a  secondary-school  system  for  the  classes 
—  exist  to-day  side  by  side.  We  in  America  did  not  develop 
such  a  class  school  system,  though  we  started  that  way.  This 
was  because  the  conception  of  education  we  finally  developed 
was  a  product  of  a  new  democratic  spirit,  as  will  be  explained 
later  on. 

QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

1.  Compare  the  attention  to  careful  religious  instruction  in  the  secondary 
schools  provided  by  the  Lutherans,  Calvinists,  and  English.  What 
analogous  instruction  do  we  provide  in  the  American  high  schook?  Is  it 
as  thorough  or  as  well  done? 

2.  Compare  the  scope  and  ideals  of  the  educational  system  provided  by  the 
Calvinists  with  the  same  for  the  Lutherans  and  Anglicans. 

3:  Just  what  kind  of  a  school  system  did  Knox  propose  (i  560)  for  Scotland? 

4.  Show  how  the  educational  program  of  the  Jesuits  reveals  Ignatius  Loyola 
as  a  man  of  vision. 

5.  Viewed  from  the  purposes  the  Order  had  in  mind,  was  it  warranted  in 
neglecting  the  education  of  the  masses? 

6.  Does  the  success  of  the  Order  show  the  importance  to  society  of  finding 
and  educating  the  future  leader?    Can  all  men  be  trained  for  leadership? 

7.  What  does  the  statement  that  the  Jesuits  were  "too  practical  to  make 


i88       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

many  changes,"  but  had  "a  keen  eye  for  what  was  best "  in  the  work  of 
others,  indicate  as  to  the  nature  of  school  administration  and  educa- 
tional progress? 

8.  Indicate  the  advantages  which  the  Jesuits  had  in  their  teachers  and 
teaching-aim  over  us  of  to-day.  How  could  we  develop  an  aim  as  clearly 
defined  and  potent  as  theirs?  Could  we  select  teachers  with  such  care? 
How? 

9.  Compare  the  religious  and  educational  propaganda  of  the  Jesuits  with 
the  recent  political  propaganda  of  the  Germans. 

10.  Compare  present  American  standards  for  teacher-training  for  elemen- 
tary and  secondary  teaching  with  those  required  by  the  Jesuits:  —  (c)  as 
to  length  of  preparation;  {b)  as  to  nature  and  scope  of  preparation. 

11.  How  do  you  explain  the  introduction  of  sewing  into  the  elementary  ver- 
nacular Catholic  schools  for  girls,  so  long  before  handiwork  for  boys 
was  thought  of? 

12.  In  schools  so  formally  organized  as  those  of  La  Salle,  how  do  you  explain 
the  freedom  allowed  in  questioning  on  arithmetic  and  the  Catechism? 

13.  Why  should  La  Salle's  work  have  been  so  opposed  by  both  Church  and 
civil  authorities? 

14.  Why  must  the  education  of  leaders  always  precede  the  education  of  the 
masses? 

15.  Explain  how  European  countries  came  naturally  to  have  two  largely 
independent  school  systems  —  a  secondary  school  for  leaders  and  an 
elementary  school  for  the  masses  —  whereas  we  have  only  one  con- 
tinuous system. 

16.  Explain  why  modern  state  systems  of  education  developed  first  in  the 
German  States,  and  why  England  and  the  Catholic  nations  of  Europe 
were  so  long  in  developing  state  school  systems. 

SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  selections  are  repro- 
duced: 

175.  Woodward:  Course  of  Study  at  the  College  of  Geneva. 

176.  Synod  of  Dort:  Scheme  of  Christian  Education  adopted. 

177.  Kilpatrick:  Work  of  the  Dutch  in  developing  Schools. 

178.  Kilpatrick:  Character  of  the  Dutch  Schools  of  1650. 

179.  Statutes:  The  Scotch  School  Law  of  1646. 

180.  Pachtler:  The  Ratio  Studiorum  of  the  Jesuits. 

i8i.  Gerard :  The  Dominant  ReHgious  Purpose  in  the  Education  of  French 

Girls. 
182.  La  Salle:  Rules  for  the  "Brothers  of  the  Christian  Schools." 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

Baird,  C.  W.    History  of  the  Rise  of  the  Huguenots  of  France. 

Baird,  C.  W.     Huguenot  Emigration  to  America. 

Grant,  Jas.     History  of  the  Burgh  Schools  of  Scotland. 

Hughes,  Thos.     Loyola,  and  the  Educational  System  of  the  Jesuits. 

Kilpatrick,  Wm.  H.     The  Dutch  Schools  of  New  Netherlands  and  Colonial 

New  York. 
Laurie,  S.  S.    History  of  Educational  Opinion  since  the  Renaissance. 
Ravelet,  A.     Blessed  J.  B.  de  la  Salle. 
Schwickerath,  R.    Jesuit  Education;  its  History  and  Principles  in  the  Light 

of  Modern  Educational  Problems. 
Woodward,  W,  H.    Education  during  the  Renaissance. 


CHAPTER  XV 

EDUCATIONAL  RESULTS  OF  THE  PROTESTANT 
REVOLTS 

III.  THE  REFORMATION  AND  AMERICAN  EDUCATION 

The  Protestant  settlement  of  America.  Columbus  had  dis- 
covered the  new  world  just  twenty-five  years  before  Luther 
nailed  his  theses  to  the  church  door  at  Wittenberg,  and  by  the 
time  the  northern  continent  had  been  roughly  explored  and  was 
ready  for  settlement,  Europe  was  in  the  midst  of  a  century  of 
warfare  in  a  vain  attempt  to  extirpate  the  Protestant  heresy.  By 
the  time  that  the  futility  of  fire  and  sword  as  means  for  rehgious 
conversion  had  finally  dawned  upon  Christian  Europe  and  found 
expression  in  the  Peace  of  Westphalia  (1648),  which  closed  the 
r  terrible  Thirty  Years'  War  (p.  160),  the  first  permanent  settle- 
Tnents  in  a  number  of  the  American  colonies  had  been  made. 
These  settlements,  and  the  beginnings  of  education  in  America, 
are  so  closely  tied  up  with  the  Protestant  Revolts  in  Europe  that 
a  chapter  on  the  beginnings  of  American  education  belongs  here 
as  still  another  phase  of  the  educational  results  of  the  Protestant 
Revolts. 

/  Practically  all  the  early  settlers  in  America  came  from  among 
the  peoples  and  from  those  lands  which  had  embraced  some  form 
of  the  Protestant  faith,  and  many  of  them  came  to  America  to 
found  new  homes  and  establish  their  churches  in  the  wilderness, 
because  here  they  could  enjoy  a  religious  freedom  impossible  in 
their  old  home-lands.  This  was  especially  true  of  the  French 
Huguenots,  many  of  whom,  after  the  revocation  of  the  Edict  of 
Nantes  (1685),  fled  to  America  and  settled  along  the  coast  of 
the  Carolinas;  .the  Calvinistic  Dutch  and  Walloons,  who  settled 
in  and  aboul  New  Amsterdam;  the  Scotch  and  Scotch-Irish 
Presbyterians,  who  settled  in  New  Jersey,  and  later  extended 
along  the  Allegheny  Mountain  ridges  into  all  the  southern  colo- 
nies; the  Enghsh  Quakers  about  Philadelphia,  who  came  under 
the  leadership  of  WilHam  Penn,  and  a  few  English  Baptists  and 
Methodists  in  eastern  Pennsylvania;  the  Swedish  Lutherans, 
along  the  Delaware;  the  German  Lutherans,  Moravians,  Mennon- 


190        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

ites,  Dunkers,  and  Reformed-Church  Germans,  who  settled  in 
large  numbers  in  the  mountain  valleys  of  Pennsylvania;  and  the 
Calvinistic  dissenters  from  the  English  National  Church,  known 
as  Puritans,  who  settled  the  New  England  colonies,  and  who, 


Fig.  40.  Map  showing  the  Religious  Settlements  in  America 


more  than  any  others,  gave  direction  to  the  future  development 
of  education  in  the  American  States.  Practically  all  of  these 
early  religious  groups  came  to  America  in  little  congregations, 
bringing  their  ministers  with  them.  Each  set  up,  in  the  colony 
in  which  it  settled,  what  were  virtually  little  religious  republics, 
that  through  them  they  might  the  better  perpetuate  the  religious 


BEGINNINGS  IN  AMERICA  191 

principles  for  which  they  had  left  the  land  of  their  birth.  Educa- 
tion of  the  young  for  membership  in  the  Church,  and  the  perpet- 
uation of  a  learned  ministry  for  the  congregations,  from  the  first 
eUcited  the  serious  attention  of  these  pioneer  settlers. 

Englishmen  who  were  adherents  of  the  English  national  faith 
(Anghcans)  also  settled  in  Virginia  and  the  other  southern  colo- 
nies, and  later  in  New  York  and  New  Jersey,  while  Maryland  was 
founded  as  the  only  Catholic  colony,  in  what  is  now  the  United 
States,  by  a  group  of  persecuted  English  Catholics  who  obtained 
a  charter  from  Charles  II,  in  1632.  These  settlements  are  shown 
on  the  map  on  the  preceding  page.  As  a  result  of  these  settle- 
ments there  was  laid,  during  the  early  colonial  period  of  American 
history,  the  foundation  of  those  type  attitudes  toward  education 
which  subsequently  so  materially  shaped  the  educational  develop- 
ment of  the  different  American  States  during  the  early  part  of  our 
national  histor}'. 

The  Puritans  in  New  England.  Of  all  those  who  came  to 
America  during  this  early  period,(the  Calvinistic  Puritans  who 
settled  the  New  England  colonies  contributed  most  that  was  val- 
uable to  the  future  educational  development  of  America,  and 
because  of  this  will  be  considered  first^) 

The  original  reformation  in  England,  as  was  stated  in  chapters 
xn  and  xm,  had  been  much  more  nominal  than  real.  The  Eng- 
lish Bible  and  the  English  Prayer-Book  had  been  issued  to  the 
churches  (R.  170),  and  the  King  instead  of  the  Pope  had  been 
declared  by  the  Act  of  Supremacy  (R.  153)  to  be  the  head  of  the 
English  National  Church.  The  same  priests,  though,  had  con- 
tinued in  the  churches  under  the  new  regime,  and  the  church  serv- 
ice had  not  greatly  changed  aside  from  its  transformation  from 
Latin  into  English.  Neither  the  Church  as  an  organization  nor 
its  members  experienced  any  great  religious  reformation.  Not  all 
Englishmen,  though,  took  the  change  in  allegiance  so  lightly 
(R.  183),  and  in  consequence  there  came  to  be  a  gradually  in- 
creasing number  who  desired  a  more  fundamental  reform  of  the 
English  Church.  (  By  1600  the  demand  for  Church  reform  had 
become  very  insisrent,  and  the  question  of  Church  purification 
(whence  the  name  "Puritans")  had  become  a  burning  question 
in  England.^ 

The  Engush  Puritans,  moreover,  were  of  two  classes.  One  was 
a  moderate  but  influential  "  low-church  "  group  within  the  *'  high  " 
State  Church,  possessed  of  no  desire  to  separate  Church  and 


192        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


Fig.  41.  Homes  of  the  Pilgrims,  and 
THEIR  Route  to  America 


State,  but  earnestly  insistent  on  ai^implification  of  the  Church, 
ceremonial,  the  elimination  of  a  number  of  the  vestiges  of  the  old 
Romish-Church  ritual,  and  particularly  the  introduction  of  more 
preaching  into  the  service.  The  other  class  constituted  a  much 
more  radical  group,  and  had  become  deeply  imbued  with  Calvin- 
istic  thinking.  fThis  group  gradually  came  into  open  opposi- 
tion to  any  State  Church, 
^tood  for  the  local  inde- 
pendence of  the  different 
churches  or  congrega- 
tions, )  and  desired  the 
complete  elimination  of 
all  vestiges  of  the  Romish 
faith  from  the  church 
services. ^  [They  became 
known  as  fndepend^ts, 
or  Separatists,  and  formed 
the  germs  of  the  later 
Congregational  groups  of 
early  New  England.  Both 
Elizabeth  (1558-1603)  and 
James  I  (1603-25)  savagely  persecuted  this  more  radical  group, 
and  many  of  their  congregations  were  forced  to  flee  from  Eng- 
land to  obtain  personal  safety  and  to  enjoy  religious  liberty  (R. 
184).  One  of  these  fugitive  congregations,  from  Scrooby,  in  north- 
central  England,  after  living  for  several  years  at  Leyden,  in 
Holland,  finally  set  sail  for  America,  landed  on  Plymouth  Rock, 
in  1620,  and  began  the  settlement  of  that  "bleak  and  stormy 
coast."  Other  congregations  soon  followed,  it  having'  been 
estimated  that  twenty  thousand  English  Puritans  migrated  to 
the  New  England  wilderness  before  1640.  These  represented  a 
fairly  well-to-do  type  of  middle-class  Englishmen,  practically  all 
of  whom  had  had  good  educational  advantages  at  home.' 

Settling  along  the  coast  in  little  groups  or  congregations,  they 
at  once  set  up  a  combined  civil  and  religious  form  of  government, 
modeled  in  a  way  after  Calvin's  City-State  at  Geneva,  and  which 
became  known  as  a  New  England  town.  In  time  the  southern 
portion  of  the  coast  of  New  England  was  dotted  with  little  self- 
governing  settlements  of  those  who  had  come  to  America  to 
obtain  for  themselves  that  religious  freedom  which  had  been 
denied  them  at  home/)  These  settlements  were  loosely  bound 


BEGINNINGS  IN  AMERICA  193 

together  in  a  colony  federation,  in  which  each  town  was  repre- 
sented in  a  General  Court,  or  legislature. 

Beginnings  of  schools  in  New  England.  C_Having  come  to 
America  to  secure  religious  freedom,  it  was  but  natural  that  the 
perpetuation  of  their  particular  faith  by  means  of  education 
should  have  been  one  of  the  first  matters  to  engage  their  atten- 
tion, after  the  building  of  their  homes  and  the  setting  up  of  the 
civil  government  (R.  185)^  Being  deeply  imbued  with  Calvin- 
istic  ideas  as  to  government  and  religion,  they  desired  to  found 
here  a  religious  commonwealth,  somewhat  after  the  model  of 
(Jeneva  (p.  159),  or  Scotland  (p.  178),  or  the  Dutch  provinces 
(p.  177),  the  comer-stones  of  which  should  be  religion  and  edu- 
cation. ^  """" 

At  first,  English  precedents  were  followed.  Home  instruction. 
which  was  quite  common  in  England  among  the  Puritans,  was 
naturally  much  employed  to  teach  the  children  to  read  the  Bible 
and  to  train  them  to  participate  in  both  the  family  and  the  con- 
gregational worship)\  After  1647,  town  elementary  schools  under 
a  master,  and  later  the  English  "dame  schools"  (chapter  xviii), 
were  established  to  provide  this  rudimentary  instruction.  The 
English  ap£rentice  system  was  also  established  (R.  201),  and  the 
masters  of  apprentices  gave  similar  instruction  to  boys  entrusted 
to  their  care.  The  town  religious  governments,  under  which  aU 
the  little  congregations  organized  themselves,  much  as  the  little 
religious  parishes  had  been  organized  in  old  England,  also  began 
the  voluntary  establishment  of  town  grammar  schools,  as  a  few 
towns  in  England  had  done  (R.  143)  before  the  Puritans  migrated. 
The  ''Latin_School"  at  Boston  dates  from  163^  and  has  had  a 
continuous  existence  since  that  time.  The  grammar  school  ^at 
Charlestown  dates  from  1636,  that  at  Ipswich  from  the  same  year, 
and  the  school  at  Salem  from  1637. 

Founding  of  Harvard  College.  In  addition  to  establishing  Latin 
gramme  schools,  a  college  was  founded,  in  1636,  by  the  General 
Court  (legislature)  of  the  Massachusetts  Bay  Colony,  to  perpetu- 
ate learning  and  insure  an  educated  ministry  (R.  185)  to  the 
churches  after  "our  present  ministers  shall  lie  in  the  dust."  This 
new  college,  located  at  Newtowne,  was  modeled  after  Emmanuel 
College  at  Cambridge,  an  English  Puritan  college  in  which  many 
of  the  early  New  England  colonists  had  studied,  and  in  loving 
memory  of  which  they  rechristened  Newtowne  as  Cambridge. 
In  1639  the  college  was  christened  Harvard  College,  after  a  grad- 


194       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

uate  of  Emmanuel  College,  Cambridge,  by  the  name  of  John 
Harvard,  who  died  in  Charlestown,  a  year  after  his  arrival  in  the 
colony,  and  who  left  the  college  his  library  of  two  hundred  jjid 
sixty  volumes  and  half  his  property,  about  £850. 

The  instruction  in  the  new  college  was  a  combination  of  the  arts_ 
and  theological  instruction  given  in  a  mediaeval  university, 
though  at  Harvard  the  President,  Master  Dunster  (R.  185),  did 
all  the  teaching.  For  the  first  fifty  years  at  Harvard  this  con- 
tinued to  be  true,  the  attendance  during  that  time  seldom  exceed- 
ing twenty.  The  entrance  requirements  for  the  college  (R.  186  a) 
call  for  the  completion  of  a  t3^ical  English  Latin  grammar-school 
education;  the  rules  and  precepts  for  the  government  of  the  col- 
lege (R.  186  b)  reveal  the  deep  religious  motive;  and  the  schedule 
of  studies  (R.  186  c)  and  the  requirements  for  degrees  (R.  186  d) 
both  show  that  the  instruction  was  true  to  the  European  type. 
In  the  charter  for  the  college,  granted  by  the  colonial  legislature  in 
1650  (R.  187  a),  we  find  exemptions  and  conditions  which  remind 
one  strongly  of  the  older  European  foundations.  A  century  later 
Brown  College,  in  Rhode  Island,  was  granted  even  more  exten- 
sive exemptions  (R.  187  b). 

The  first  colonial  legislation:  the  Law  of  1642.  We  thus  see 
manifested  early  in  New  England  the  deep  Puritan-Calvinistic 
zeal  for  learning  as  a  bulwark  of  Church  and  State.  We  also  see 
the  establishment  in  the  wilderness  of  New  England  of  a  typical 
English  educational  system  —  that  is,  private  instruction  in  read- 
ing and  religion  by  the  parents  in  the  home  and  by  Ihe  masters  of 
apprentices,  and  later  by  a  town  schoolmaster;  the  Latin  grammar 
school  in  the  larger  towns,  to  prepare  boys  for  the  college  of  the 
colony;  and  an  English- type  college  to  prepare  them  for  the  min- 
istry. As  in  England,  too,  all  was  clearly  subordinate  to  the 
Church\  Still  further,  as  in  England  also,  the  system  was  volun- 
tary, tlie  deep  religious  interest  which  had  brought  the  congrega- 
tions to  America  being  depended  upon  to  insure  for  all  the  neces- 
sary education  and  religious  training. 

It  early  became  evident,  though,  that  these  voluntary  efforts 
on  the  part  of  the  people  and  the  towns  would  not  be  sufiicient  to 
insure  that  general  education  which  was  required  by  the  Puritan 
religious  theory.,  Under  the  hard  pioneer  conditions,  and  the  suf- 
fering which  ensued,  many  parents  and  masters  of  apprentices 
evidently  proved  neglectful  of  their  educational  duties.'  Accord- 
ingly the  Church  appealed  to  its  servant,  the  State,  as  represented 


BEGINNINGS  IN  AMERICA  195 

in  the  colonial  legislature  (General  Court)  to  assist  it  in  compelling 
parents  and  masters  to  observe  their  religious  obligations!/  The 
result  was  the  famous  Massachusetts  Law  of  1642  (R.  190),  which 
directed  "the  chosen  men"  (Selectmen;  Councilmen)  of  each 
town  to  ascertain,  from  time  to  time,  if  the  parents  and  masters 
were  attending  to  their  educational  duties)  if  the  children  were 
being  trained  "in  learning  and  labor  and  other  employments  .  .  . 
profitable  to  the  Commonwealth";  and  if  children  were  being 
taught  "to  read  and  understand  the  principjes  of  religion  and  the 
capital  laws  of  the  country,"  and  empowered  them  to  impose  fines 
on  "those  who  refuse  to  render  such  accounts  to  them  when  re- 
quired." 

C  The  Law  of  j_642js  remarkable  in  that,  for  the  first  time  in  the 
English-speaking  world,  a  legislative  body  representing  the  State_ 
ordered  that  aJJ,  children  should  be  taught  to  read.)  This  law  the 
Selectmen,  or  the  courts  if  they  failed  to  do  so,  were  ordered  to 
enforce,  and  the  courts  usually  looked  after  their  duties  in  the 
matter  (R.  192),^ 

The  Law  of  1647.  The  Law  of  1642  did  not,  however,  establish 
schools,  or  direct  the  employment  of  schoolmasters.  The  pro- 
vision of  education,  after  the  English  fashion,  was  still  left  with 
the  homes.  After  a  trial  of  five  years,  the  results  of  which  were 
not  satisfactory,  the  General  Court  enacted  another  law  by  means 
of  which  it  has  been  asserted  that  "the  Puritan  government  of 
Massachusetts  rendered  probably  its  greatest  service  to  the 
future." 

After  recounting  in  a  preamble  (R.  191)  that  it  had  in  the  past 
been  "one  cheife  piect  of  y*  ould  deluder,  Satan,  to  keepe  men 
from  the  knowledge  of  y^  Scriptures,  ...  by  keeping  y"  in  an  un- 
knowne  tongue,"  so  now  "by  pswading  from  y^  use  of  tongues," 
and  "  obscuring  y^  true  sence  &  meaning  of  y^  originall "  by  "  false 
glosses  of  saint-seeming  deceivers,"  learning  was  in  danger  of 
being  "buried  in  y^  grave  of  o'  fath"^  in  y*  church  and  comon- 
wealth";  the  Court  ordered: 

1.  That  every  town  having  fifty  householders  should  at  once  appoint 
a  teacher  of  reading  and  writing,  and  provide  for  his  wages  in  such 
manner  as  the  town  might  determine;  and 

2.  That  every  town  ha\ing  one  hundred  householders  must  provide 
a  grammar  school  to  fit  youths  for  the  university,  under  a  p)en- 
alty  of  £5  (afterwards  increased  to  £20)  for  failure  to  do  so. 

This  law  represents  a  distinct  step  in  advance  over  the  Law  of 


196       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


1642,  and  for  this  there  are  no  English  precedents.  It  was  not 
until  the  latter  part  of  the  nineteenth  century  that  England  took 
such  a  step.  The  precedents  for  the  compulsory  establishment  of 
schools  lie  rather  in  the  practices  of  the  different  German  States 
(p.  167),  the  actions  of  the  Dutch  S3Tiods  (R.  176)  and  provinces 
(p.  177),  the  Acts  of  the  Scottish  parliament  of  1633  and  1646 
(p.  178;  R.  179),  and  the  general  Calvinistic  principle  that  educa- 
tion was  an  important  function  of  a  religious  State. 

Principles  established.  The  State  here,  acting  again  as  the 
servant  of  the  Church,  enacted  a  law  and  fixed  a  tradition  which 
prevailed  and  grew  in  strength  and  effectiveness  after  State  and 
Church  had  parted  company.  Not  only  was  a  schooTsystem 
ordered  established  —  elementary  for  all  towns  and  children,  and 
secondary  for  youths  in  the  larger  towns  —  but,  for  the  first  time 
among  English-speaking  people,  there  was  an  assertion  of  the  right 
of  the  State  to  require  communities  to  estabhsh  and  maintain 
schools,  under  penalty  if  they  refused  to  do  so.  It  can  be  safely 
asserted,  in  the  light  of  later  developments,  that  the  two  laws  of 
1642  and  1647  represent  the  foundations  upon  which  our  American 
state  pubHc -school  systems  have  been  built. 

Influence  on  other  New  England  colonies.  Connecticut  Col- 
ony, in  its  Law  of  1650  establishing  a  school  system,  combined  the 
spirit  of  the  Massachusetts  Law  of  1642,  though  stated  in  differ- 
ent words  (R.  193), 
and  the  Law  of  1647, 
stated  word  for  word. 
New  Haven  Colony, 
in  1655,  ordered  that 
children  and  appren- 
tices should  be  taught 
to  read,  as  had  been 
done  in  Massachu- 
setts, in  1642,  but  on 
the  union  of  New  Ha- 
ven and  Connecticut 
Colonies,  in  1665,  the 
Connecticut  Code  be- 
came the  law  for  the 
united  colonies.  In 
1702  a  college  was  founded  (Yale)  and  finally  located  at  Ngs^. 
Haven,  to  offer  pre;^ration  for  the  ministry  in  the  Connecticut 


Fig.  42.  Where  Yale  College  was  founded 
The  home  of  the  Reverend  Samuel  Russell,  at  Bran- 
ford,  Conn.  The  first  meeting  to  organize  the  college 
was  held  there,  in  September,  1701 


^  'j^^^-'^'^^'^*'^^  IN  AMERICA  197 

colony,  as  had  been  done  earlier  in  Massachusetts,  and  Latin 
gr^nmar  schools  were  founded  in  the  Connecticut  towns  to  pre- 
pare for  the  new  college,  as  also  had  been  done  earlier  in  Massa- 
chusetts. The  rules  and  regulations  for  the  grammar  school  at 
Newilayen  (R.  189)  reveaLthe  purpose  and  describe  the  instruc- 
tion provided  in  one  of  the  earliest  and  best  of  these.         ' 

Plyniouth  Colony,  in  1658  and  again  in  1663,  proposed  to  the 
towns  that  they  "sett  vp"  a  schoolmaster  "to  traine  vp  children 
to  reading  and  writing"  (R.  i94~a).  In  1622  the  towns  were 
asked  to  aid  Harvard  College  by  gif  ts  (R.  194  b).  In  1673-74  the 
income  from  the  Cape  Cod  fisheries  was  set  aside  for  the  support 
oLa  (grammar)  school  (R.  194  c).  Finally,  in  1677,  all  towns 
having  over  fifty  families  and  maintaining  a  grammar  school  were 
ordered  aided  from  the  fishery  proceeds  (R.  194  d). 

The  Massachusetts  laws  also  applied  to  Maine,  New  Hamp)- 
shire,  and  Vermont,  as  these  were  then  a  part  of  Massachusetts 
Colony.  When  New  Hampshire  separated  off,  in  1680,  the 
Massachusetts  Laws  of  1642  and  1647  were  continued  in  force. 
In  Maine  and  Vejinont  there  were  so  few  settlers,  until  near  the 
beginning  of  our  national  life,  that  the  influence  of  the  Massa;;^ 
chusetts  legislation  on  these  States  was  negligible  until  a  later 
period. 

Only  in  Rhode  Island  and  Providence  Plantations,  of  all  the 
New  England  colonies,  did  the  Massachusetts  legislation  fail  to 
exert  a  deep  influence.  Settled  as  these  two  had  been  by  refugees 
from  New  England,  and  organized  on  a  basis  of  hospitality  to  all 
who  suffered  from  religious  oppression  elsewhere,  the  religious 
stimulus  to  the  founding  of  schools  naturally  was  lacking.  As 
the  rehgious  basis  for  education  was  as  yet_the  only  basis,  the 
first  development  of  schools  in  Rhode  Island  awaited  the  humani- 
tarian and  economic  influences  which  did  not  become  operative 
until  early  in  the  nineteenth  century. 

Outside  of  the  New  England  colonies,  the  appeal  to  the  State 
as  the  servant  of  the  Church  was  seldom  made  during  the  early 
colonial  period,  the  churches  handling  the  educational  problem 
in  their  own  way.  As  a  result  the  beginnings  of  State  oversight 
and  control  were  left  to  New  England.  In  the  central  colonies  a 
series  of  parochial-school  systems  came  to  prevail,  while  in  Episco- 
palian Virginia  and  the  other  colonies  to  the  south  the  no-business-  * 
of-the-State  attitude  assumed  toward  education  by  the  mother 
country,  was  copied. 


198        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

y  The  chtirch  schools  of  New  York.  New  Netherland,  as  New 
York  Colony  was  called  before  the  English  occupation,  was  settled 
by  the  Dutch  West  India  Company,  and  some  dozen  villages  about 
New  York  and  up  the  Hudson  had  been  founded  by  the  time  it 
passed  to  the  control  of  the  English,  in  1664.  In  these  the  Dutch 
established  typical  home-land  public  parochial  schools,  under  the 
control  of  the  Reformed  Dutch  Church.  The  schoolmaster  was 
usually  the  reader  and  precentor  in  the  church  as  well  (R.  195), 
and  often  acted,  as  in  Holland,  as  sexton  besides.  Girls  attended 
on  equal  terms  with  boys,  but  sat  apart  and  recited  in  separate 
classes.  The  instruction  consisted  of  reading  and  writing  Dutch, 
sometimes  a  little  arithmetic,  the  Dutch  Catechism,  the  reading 
of  a  few  religious  books,  and  certain  prayers.  The  rules  (1661)  , 
for  a  schoolmaster  in  New  Amsterdam  (R.  196),  and  the  contract 
with  a  Dutch  schoolmaster  in  Flatbush  (R.  195),  dating  from 
1682,  reveal  the  type  of  schools  and  school  conditions  provided. 
All  except  the  children  of  the  poor  paid  fees  to  the  schoolmastgr.^} 
He  was  licensed  by  the  Dutch  church  authorities.  As'  the  Dutch 
had  not  come  to  America  because  of  persecution,  and  were  in  no 
way  out  of  sympathy  with  rehgious  conditions  in  the  home-land, 
the  schools  they  developed  here  were  typical  of  the  Dutch  Euro- 
pean parochial  schools  of  the  time  (R.  178).  A  trimal  (Latin) 
school  was  also  established  in  New  York,  in  1652. 

The  parochial  schools  of  Pennsylvania.  Pennsylvania  was 
settled  by  Quakers,  Baptists,  Methodists,  Presbyterians,  German 
Lutherans,  Moravians,  Mennonites,  and  members  of  the  German 
Reformed  Church,  all  of  whom  came  to  America  to  secure  greater 
religious  liberty  and  had  been  attracted  to  this  colony  by  the  free- 
dom of  religious  worship  which  Penn  had  provided  for  there.  All 
these  were  Protestant  sects,  all  beheved  in  the  necessity  of  learn- 
ing to  read  the  Bible  as  a  means  to  personal  salvation,  and  all 
made  efforts  looking  toward  the  estabhshment  of  schools  as  a  part 
of  their  church  organization.  Unlike  New  England,  though,  no 
sect  was  in  a  majority;  church  control  for  each  denomination  was 
considered  as  most  satisfactory;  and  no  appeal  was  made  to  the 
State  to  have  it  assist  the  churches  in  the  enforcement  of  their 
religious  purposes.  The  clergymen  were  usually  the  teachers  in 
the  parochial  schools  established,  while  private  pay  schools  were 
opened  in  the  villages  and  towns/  These  were  taught  in  English, 
German,  or  the  Moravian  tongue  (Czech),  according  to  the  orig- 
inal language  of  the  different  immigrants.    The  Quakers  seem  to 


BEGINNINGS  IN  AMERICA 


199 


Fig.  43.    An  Old  Quaker  Meeting- 
house AND  School  at  Lampeter, 
Pennsylvania 
(From  an  old  drawing) 


have  taken  particular  interest  in  schools  (R.  199),  a  Quaker  school 
in  Philadelphia  (R.  198)  hav- 
ing been  estabUshed  the  year 
the  city  was  founded.  Girls 
were  educated  as  well  as  boys, 
and  the  emphasis  was  placed 
on  reading,  writing,  counting, 
and  religion,  rather  than  up>on 
any  higher  form  of  training. 

The  result  was  the  devel- 
opment in  this  colony  of  a 
policy  of  depending  on  church 
and  private  effort,  and  the 
provision  of  education,  aside 
from  certain  rudimentary  and 
rehgious  instruction,  was  left 
largely  for  those  who  could  afford  to  pay  for  the  privilege^ 
Charitable  education  was  extended  to  but  a  few,  for  a  short 
time,  while,  under  the  freedom  allowed,  many  communities  made 
but  indifferent  provisions  or  suffered  their  schools  to  lapse. 
Under  the  primitive  conditions  of  the  time  the  interest  even 
in  rehgious  education  often  declined  almost  to  the  vanishing 
point. 

Virginia  and  the  southern  type.  Almost  all  the  conditions 
attending  the  settlement  of  Virginia  were  in  contrast  to  those  of 
the  New  England  colonies.  The  early  settlers  were  from  the  same 
class  of  EngUsh  yeomen  and  country  squires,  but  with  the  impor- 
tant difference  that  whereas  the  New  England  settlers  were  Dis- 
senters from  the  Church  of  England  and  had  come  to  America  to 
obtain  freedom  in  rehgious  worship,  the  settlers  in  Virginia  were 
adherents  of  the  National  Church  and  had  come  to  America  for 
gain.  The  marked  differences  in  climate  and  possible  crops  led 
to  the  large  plantation  type  of  settlement,  instead  of  the  compact 
httle  New  England  town;  tlje  introduction  of  large  numbers  of 
"indentured  white  servants,"  and  later  negro  slaves,  led  to  the 
development  of  classes  in  society  instead  of  to  the  New  England 
type  of  democracy;  and  the  lack  of  a  strong  rehgious  motive  for 
education  naturally  led  to  the  adoption  of  the  customary  English 
practices  instead  of  to  the  development  of  colonial  schools.  The 
tutor  in  the  home,  education  in  small  priva.te  pay  schpols,  or  edu- 
cation in  the  mother  country  were  the  prevailing  methods  adopted 


200       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

among  the  well-to-do  planters,  while  the  poorer  classes  were  left 
with  only  such  advantages  as  apprenticeship  training  or  charity 
schools  might  provide.  Throughout  the  entire  colonial  period 
Virginia  remained  most  like  the  mother  country  in  spirit  and 
practice,  and  stands  among  the  colonies  as  the  clearest  example 
of  the  English  attitude  toward  school  support  and  control.  As 
in  the  mother  country,  education  was  considered  to  be  no  business 
of  the  State.  Rhode  Island,  New  York,  New  Jersey,  Delaware, 
and  the  Carolinas  followed  the  EngUsh  attitude,  much  after  the 
fashion  of  Virginia.  During  the  entire  colonial  period  the  indif- 
ference of  the  mother  country  to  general  education  was  steadily 
reflected  in  Virginia  and  in  the  colonies  which  were  essentially 
Anglican  in  religion,  and  followed  the  English  example. 

Type  plans  represented  by  1750.  The  seventeenth  century 
thus  witnessed  the  transplanting  of  European  ideas  as  to  govern- 
ment, religion,  and  education  to  the  new  American  colonies,  and 
by  the  eighteenth  century  we  find  three  clearly  marked  types  of 
educational  practice  or  conception  as  to  educational  responsibility 
estabhshed  on  American  soil..  """ 

The  first  was  the  strong  Calyinistic  conception  of  a  religious 
State,  supporting  a  system  of  common  vernacular  schools,  higher 
Latin  schools,  and  a  college,  for  both  religious  and  civic  ends. 
This  type  dominated  New  England,  and  is  best  represented  by 
Massachusetts.  From  New  England  this  attitude  was  carried 
westward  by  the  inigrations  of  New  England  people,  and  deeply 
influenced  the  educational  development  of  all  States  to  which  the 
New  Englander  went  in  any  large  numbers.  This  was  the  edu- 
cational contribution  of  Calvinism  to  America.  Out  of  it  our 
state  school  systems  of  to-day,  by  the  separation  of  Church  and 
State,  have  been  evolved. 

-  The  second  was  the  parochial-school  conception  of  the  Dutch, 
Moravians,  Mennonites,  German  Lutherans,  German  Reformed 
Church,  Quakers,  Presbyterians,  Baptists,  and  CathoHcs.  This 
type  is  best  represented  by  Protestant  Pennsylvania  and  Catholic 
Maryland.  It  stood  for  church  control  of  all  educational  efforts, 
resented  state  interference,  was  dominated  only  by  church  pur- 
poses, and  in  time  came  to  be  a  serious  obstacle  in  the  way~of 
rational  state  school  organization  and  controL 

The  third  type,  into  which  the  second  type  tended  to  fuse,  con- 
ceived of  pubHc  education,  aside  from  collegiate  education,  as 
intended  chiefly  for  orphans  and  the  children  of  the  poor,  and  as 


BEGINNINGS  IN  AMERICA  •    201 

a  charity  which  the  State  was  under  little  or  no  obligation  to 
assist  in  supporting.  All  children  of  the  upper  and  middle  classes 
in  society  attended  private  or  church  schools,  or  were  taught  by 
tutors  in  their  homes,  and  for  such  instruction  paid  a  proper  tui- 
tion fee^  Paupers  and  orphans,  in  limited  numbers  and  for  a 
limited  ume,  might  be  provided  with  some  form  of  useful  educa- 
tion at  the  expense  of  either  Church  or  State,,  This  type  is  best 
represented  by  An^Ucan  Virginia,  which  typified  well  the'laissez- 
faire  policy  which  dominated  England  from  the  time  of  the 
Protestant  Reformation  until  the  latter  half  of  the  nineteenth 
century. 

These  three  types  of  attitude  toward  the  provision  of  education 
became  fixed  American  t3rpes,  and  each  deeply  influenced  subse- 
quent American  educational  development,  as  we  shall  point  out 
in  a  later  chapter. 

Dominance  of  the  religious  motive.  The  seventeenth  century 
was  essentially  a  period  of  the  transplanting,  almost  unchanged  in 
form,  of  the  characteristic  European  institutions,  manners,  reli- 
gious attitudes,  and  forms  of  government  to  American  shores. 
Each  sect  or  nationality  on  arriving  set  up  in  the  new  land  the 
characteristic  forms  of  church  and  school  and  social  observances 
known  in  the  old  home-land.  .'  Dutch,  Germans,  English,  Scotch, 
Calvinists,  Lutherans,  Anglicans,  Presbyterians  —  reproduced  in 
the  American  colonies  the  main  type  of  schools  existing  at  the 
time  of  their  migration  in  the  mother  land  from  which  they  camey 
They  were  also  dominated  by  the  same  deep  religious  purpose. 

The  dominance  of  this  religious  purpose  in  all  instruction  is 
well  illustrated  by  the  great  beginning-school  book  of  the  time. 
The  New  England  Primer.  A  digest  of  the  contents  of  this,  with 
a  few  pages  reproduced,  is  given  in  R.  202.  This  book,  from  which 
all  children  learned  to  read,  was  used  by  Dissenters  and  Lutherans 
alike  in  the  American  colonies.  This  book  Ford  well  characterizes 
in  the  following  words: 

As  one  glances  over  what  may  truly  be  called  "  The  Little  Bible  of 
New  England,"  and  reads  its  stem  lessons,  the  Puritan  mood  is  caught 
with  absolute  faithfulness.  Here  was  no  easy  road  to  knowledge  and 
salvation;  but  with  prose  as  bare  of  beauty  as  the  whitewash  of  their 
churches,  with  poetry  as  rough  and  stem  as  their  storm-torn  coast, 
with  pictures  as  crude  and  unfinished  as  their  owti  glacial-smoothed 
boulders,  between  stiff  oak  covers  which  symbolized  the  contents,  the 
children  were  tutored,  until,  from  being  unregenerate,  and  as  Jonathan 
Edwards  said,  "yoimg  vipers,  and  infinitely  more  hateful  than  vipers" 


I 


202    •  A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

to  God,  they  attained  that  happy  state  when,  as  expressed  by  Judge 
Sewell's  child,  they  were  afraid  that  they  "should  goe  to  hell,"  and  were 
"stirred  up  dreadfully  to  seek  God."  God  was  made  sterner  and 
more  cruel  than  any  living  judge,  that  all  might  be  brought  to  realize 
how  slight  a  chance  even  the  least  erring  had  of  escaping  eternal 
damnation. 

One  learned  to  read  chiefly  that  one  might  be  able  to  read  the 
Catechism  and  the  Bible,  and  to  know  the  will  of  the  Heavenly 
Father.  There  was  scarcely  any  other  purpose  in  the  mainte- 
nance of  elementary  schools.  In  the  grammar  schools  and  the 
colleges  students  were  "instructed  to  consider  well  the  main  end 
of  life  and  studies."  These  institutions  existed  mainly  to  insure 
a  supply  of  learned  ministers  for  service  in  Church  and  State. 
Such  studies  as  history,  geography,  science,  music,  drawing,  secu- 
lar literature,  and  organized  play  were  unknown.  Children  were 
constantly  surrounded,  week  days  and  Sundays,  by  the  somber 
Calvinistic  religious  atmosphere  in  New  England,  and  by  the 
careful  religious  oversight  of  the  pastors  and  elders  in  the  colonies 
where  the  parochial-school  system  was  the  ruling  plan  for  educa- 
tion. Schoolmasters  were  required  to  "catechise  their  scholars 
in  the  principles  of  the  Christian  religion,"  and  it  was  made  "a 
chief  part  of  the  schoolmaster's  religious  care  to  commend  his 
scholars  and  his  labors  amongst  them  unto  God  by  prayer  morn- 
ing and  evening,  taking  care  that  his  scholars  do  reverently  attend 
during  the  same."  Religious  matter  constituted  the  only  reading 
matter,  outside  the  instruction  in  Latin  in  the  grammar  schools. 
The  Cq^techism  was  taught,  and  the  Bible  was  read  and  ex- 
pounded. Church  attendance  was  required,  and  grammar-school 
pupils  were  obliged  to  report  each  week  on  the  Sunday  sermon. 
This  insistence  on  the  religious  element  was  more  prominent  in 
Calyinijtic  New  England  than  in  the  colonies  to  the  south,  but 
everywhere  the^religious  purpose  was  dominant.  The  church 
parochial  and  charity  schools  were  essentially  schools  for  instilling 
the  church  practices  and  beliefs  of  the  church  maintaining  them. 
This  state  of  affairs  continued  until  well  toward  the  beginning  of 
the  nineteenth  century. 

QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

1.  Compare  the  conservative  and  radical  groups  in  the  English  purification 
movement  with  the  conservative  and  radical  groups,  as  typified  by  Eras- 
mus and  Luther,  at  the  time  of  the  Reformation. 

2.  Show  how,  for  each  group,  the  schools  established  were  merely  home- 


k-M.-rv^  (.?«.•»-  BEGININNGS  IN  AMERICA  /  203 

land  foreign-type  religious  schools,  with  nothing  distinctively  American 
about  them. 
-3.  Show  why  such  copv-ing  of  home-land  types,  even  to  the  Latin  grammar 
school,  was  perfectly  natural. 

4.  The  provision  of  the  Law  of  1642  requiring  instruction  in  "the  capital 
laws  of  the  country"  was  new.  How  do  you  explain  this  addition  to 
mother-land  practices? 

5.  Show  why  the  Law  of  1642  was  Calvinistic  rather  than  Anglican  in  its 
origin. 

^     6.  Explain  the  meaning  of  the  preamble  to  the  Law  of  1647. 

7.  Show  how  the  Law  of  1647  must  go  back  for  precedents  to  German, 
Dutch,  and  Scotch  sources. 
^2>.  Show  also  that  the  Law  of  1647,  as  well  as  modern  state  school  laws,  is 
neither  paternalistic  nor  socialistic  in  essential  purpose. 
g.  Show  that,  though  the  mixture  of  religious  sects  in  Pennsylvania  made 
colonial  legislation  difficult,  stiU  it  would  have  been  possible  to  have 
enforced  the  Massachusetts  Law  of  1642,  or  the  Pennsylvania  laws  of 
^  1683  or  i6q3,  in  the  colony.     How  do  you  explain  the  opposition  and 

failure  to  do  so? 

10.  Show  how  the  charity  schools  for  the  f)oor,  and  church  missionary-society 
schools,  were  the  natural  outcome  of  the  English  attitude  toward  ele- 
mentary education. 

11.  Which  of  the  three  type  plans  in  the  American  colonies  by  1750  most 
influenced  educational  development  in  your  State? 

12.  State  the  important  contribution  of  Calvinism  to  our  new-world  life. 

13.  Explain  the  indifference  of  the  Anglican  Church  to  general  education 
during  the  whole  of  our  colonial  period. 

14.  Explain  what  is  meant  by  '.'  The  Puritan  Church  appealed  to  its  servant, 
the  State,"  etc. 

SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  selections  are  repro- 
duced : 

183.  Nichols:  The  Puritan  Attitude. 

184.  Gov.  Bradford:  The  Puritans  leave  England. 

185.  First  Fruits:  The  Founding  of  Harvard  College. 

186.  First  Fruits:  The  First  Rules  for  Harvard  College. 

(c)  Entrance  Requirements. 
{b)  Rules  and  Precepts. 

(c)  Time  and  Order  of  Studies. 

(d)  Requirements  for  Degrees. 

187.  College  Charters:  Extracts  from,  showing  Privileges. 
■^  (o)  Harvard  College,  1650. 

{b)  Brown  College,  1764. 

188.  Dillaway:  Founding  of  the  Free  School  at  Roxburie. 

189.  Baird:  Rules  and  Regulations  for  Hopkins  Grammar  School. 

190.  Statutes:  The  Massachusetts  Law  of  1642. 

191.  Statutes:  The  Massachusetts  Law  of  1647. 

192.  Court  Records:  Presentment  of  Topsfield  for  Violating  the  Law  of 
1642. 

193.  Statutes:  The  Connecticut  Law  of  1650. 

194.  Statutes:  Plymouth  Colony  Legislation. 

195.  Flatbush:  Contract  with  a  Dutch  Schoolmaster. 

196.  New  Amsterdam:  Rules  for  a  Schoolmaster  in. 


204       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

197.  Statutes:  The  Pennsylvania  Law  of  1683. 

198.  Minutes  of  Council:  The  First  School  in  Philadelphia. 

199.  Murray:  Early  Quaker  Injunctions  regarding  Schools. 

200.  Statutes:  Apprenticeship  Laws  in  the  Southern  Colonies. 

(a)  Virginia  Statutes. 

(b)  North  Carolina  Court  Records. 

201.  Stiles:  A  New  England  Indenture  of  Apprenticeship. 

202.  The  New  England  Primer:  Description  and  Digest. 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

Boone,  R.  G.    Education  in  the  United  States. 
Brown,  S.  W.     The  Secularization  of  American  Education. 
Cheyney,  Edw.  P.    European  Background  of  American  Education. 
Dexter,  E.  G.    A  History  of  Education  in  the  United  States. 
*Eggleston,  Edw.     The  Transit  of  Civilization. 
Fisk,  C.  R.     "The  English  Parish  and  Education  at  the  Beginning  of 
American  Civilization";  in  School  Review,  vol.  23,  pp.  433-49.     (Sep- 
tember, 191 5.) 
*Ford,  P.  L.     The  New  England  Primer. 
*Heatwole,  C.  J.    A  History  of  Education  in  Virginia. 
Jackson,  G.  L.     The  Development  of  School  Support  in  Colonial  Massa- 
chusetts. 
*Kilpatrick,  Wm,  H.    The  Dutch  Schools  of  New  Netherlands  and  Colonial 

New  York. 
*Knight,  E.  W.    Public  School  Education  in  North  Carolina. 
*Martin,  Geo.  H.    Evolution  of  the  Massachusetts  Public  School  System. 
Seybolt,  R.  F.     Apprenticeship  and  Apprentice  Education  in  Colonial 
New  York  and  New  England. 
*Small,  W.  H.    "The  New  England  Grammar  School";  in  School  Review, 
vol.  10,  pp.  513-31.     (September,  1902.) 
Small,  W.  H.    Early  New  England  Schools. 


C/v 


CHAPTER  XVI 
THE  RISE  OF  SCIENTIFIC  INQUIRY 

New  attitudes  after  the  eleventh  century.  From  the  begin- 
ning of  the  tweKth  century  onward,  as  we  have  already  noted, 
there  had  been  a  slow  but  gradual  change  in  the  character  of  hit 
man  thinking,  and  a  slow  but  certain  disintegration  of  the  Medi- 
aeval^System,  with  its  repressive  attitude  toward  all  independent 
thinking.  Many  different  influences  and  movements  had  con- 
tributed to  this  change,  all  of  which  had  tended  to  transform 
the  mediaeval  noa^and  change  his  ways  of  thinking.  New  ob- 
jects of  interest  slowly  came  to  the  front,  and  new  standards  of 
judgment  gradually  were  applied.  In  consequence  the  mediaeval 
man,  with  his  feeling  of  personal  insignificance  and  lack  of~seff- 
confidence,  came  to  be  replaced  by  a  small  I)ut  increasing  number 
of  men  who  were  conscious  of  their  powers,  possessed  a  new  self- 
confidence,  and  realized  new  possibilities  of  intellectual  accom- 
pHshment. 

The  Reviyal  of  Learning,  first  in  Italy  and  then  elsewhere  in 
western  Europe,  was  the  natural  consequence  of  this  awakening 
of  the  modern  spirit,  and  in  the  careful  work  done  by  the  human- 
istic scholars  of  the  Itahan  Renaissance  in  collecting,  comparing7 
questioning,  inferring,  criticizing,  and  editing  the  texts,  and  in 
reconstructing  the  ancient  life  and  history,  we  see  the  beginnings 
of  the  modern  scientific  spirit.  It  was  this  same  critical,  question- 
ing spirit  which,  when  applied  later  to  geographical  knowledge, 
led  to  the  discovery  of  America  and  the  circumnavigation  of  the 
globe;  which,  when  applied  to  matters  of  Christian  faith,  brought 
on  the  Protectant  Revolts;  which,  when  applied  to  the  problems 
of  the  universe^  revealed  the  many  wonderful  fields  of  modem 
science;  and  which,  when  appUed  to  government,  led  to  a  ques- 
tioning of  the  xiivine  right  of  kings  and  the  rise  of  constitutional 
government.  (The  awakening  of  scientific  inquiry  and  the  scien- 
tific jpirit,  and  the  attempt  of  a  few  thinkers  to  apply  the  new 
method  to  education,  to  which  we  now  turn,  may  be  regarded  as 
only  another  phase  of  the  awakening  of  the  modern  inquisitive 
spirit  which  found  expression  earher  in  the  rise  of  the  universities, 
the  recovery  and  reconstruction  of  the  ancient   learning,  the 


2o6       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

awakening  of  geographical  discovery  and  exploration,  and  the 
questioning  of  the  doctrines  and  prac^es  of  the  Mediaeval 
Church. 

The  Christian  reaction  against  inquiry.  The  Christian  attitude 
toward  inquiry  was  from  the  first  inhospitable,  and  in  time  be- 
came exceedingly  intolerant. 

The  history  of  Christianity  throughout  all  the  Dark  Ages  is  a 
history  of  the  distrust  of  inquiry  and  reason,  and  the  emphasis  of 
blind  emotional  faith.  Mysticism,  good  and  evil  spirits,  and  the 
interpretation  of  natural  phenomena  as  manifestations  of  the  Di- 
vine will  from  the  first  received  large  emphasis.  The  worship  of 
saints  and  relics,  and  the  great  development  of  the  sensuous  and 
symboHc,  changed  the  earlier  rehgion  into  a  crude  polytheisin. 
During  the  long  period  of  the  Middle  Ages  the  miraculous  flour- 
ished. The  most  extreme  superstition  pervaded  all  ranks  of  soci- 
ety. Magic-and  prayers  were  employed  to  heal  the  sick,  restore 
the  crippled,  foretell  the  future,  and  punish  the  wicked.  Sacred 
pools,  "tEe^  royal  touch,  wonder-working  images,  and  miracles 
through  prayer  stood  in  the  way  of  the  development  of  medicine 
(R.  204).  Disease  was  attributed  to  satanic  influence,  and  a  regu- 
lar schedule  of  prayers  for  cures  was  in  use.  Sanitation  was  un- 
known. Plagues  and  pestilences  were  manifestations  of  Divine 
wrath,  and  hysteria  and  insanity  were  possession  by  the  devil  to 
be  cast  out  by  whipping  and  torture.  One's  future  was  deter- 
mined by  the  position  of  the  heavenly  bodies  at  the  time  of 
birth.  Eclipses,  meteors,  and  comets  were  fearful  portents  of 
Divine  displeasure: 

Eight  things  there  be  a  Comet  brings, 

When  it  on  high  doth  horrid  rage; 
Wind,  Famine,  Plague,  and  Death  to  Kings, 

War,  Earthquakes,  Floods,  and  Direful  Change. 

The  literature  on  magic  was  extensive.  The  most  miraculous 
happenings  were  recorded  and  believed.  Trial  by  ordeal,  follow- 
ing careful  rehgious  formulae,  was  common  before  1200,  though 
prohibited  shortly  afterward  by  papal  decrees  (12 15,  1222).  The 
insistence  of  the  Church  on  "the  willful,  deviHsh  character  of 
heresy,"  and  the  extension  of  heresy  to  cover  almost  any  form  of 
honest  doubt  or  independent  inquiry,  caused  an  intellectual  stag- 
nation along  lines  of  scientific  investigation  which  was  not  re- 
lieved for  more  than  a  thousand  years.  The  many  notable  ad- 
vances in  physics,  chemistry,  astronomy,  and  medicine  made  by 


THE  RISE  OF  SCIENTIFIC  INQUIRY      207 

Moslem  scholars  (chapter  viii)  were  lost  on  Christian  Europe, 
and  had  to  be  worked  out  again  centuries  later  by  the  scholars  of 
the  western  world.  Out  of  the  astronomy  of  the  Arabs  the  Chris- 
tians got  only  astrology;  out  of  their  chemistry  they  got  only  al- 
chemy. Both  in  time  stood  seriously  in  the  way  of  real  scientific 
thinking  and  discovery. 

The  effect  of  these  rehgious  revolts  on  the  attitude  of  the 
Church  toward  intellectual  hberty  was  natural  and  marked.  The 
tolerance  of  inquiry  recently  extended  was  withdrawn,  and  an  era 
of  steadily  increasing  intolerance  set  in  which  was  not  broken  for 
more  than  a  century.  In  an  effort  to  stop  the  further  spread  of 
the  heresy,  the  Church  Council  of  Trent  (1545-63)  adopted 
stringent  regulations  against  heretical  teachings  (p.  303),  while 
the  sword  and  torch  and  imprisonment  were  resorted  to  to  stamp 
out  opposition  and  win  back  the  revolting  lands.  A  century  of 
merciless  warfare  ensued,  and  the  hatreds  engendered  by  the  long 
and  bitter  struggle  over  religious  differences  put  both  Ca^plic 
and  Protestant  Europe  in  no  tolerant  frame  of  mind  toward  in- 
quiry or  new  ideas. 

It  was  into  this  post-Reformation  atmosphere  of  suspicion  and 
distrust  and  hatred  that  the  new  critical,  inquiring,  questioning 
spirit  of  science,  as  applied  to  the  forces  of  the  universe,  was  bom. 
A  century  earlier  the  first  scientists  might  have  obtained  a  respect- 
ful hearing,  and  might  have  been  permitted  to  press  their  claims; 
after  the  Protestant  Revolts  had  torn  Christian  Europe  asunder 
this  could  hardh'  be.  As  a  result  the  early  scientists  found  them- 
selves in  no  enviable  position.  Their  theories  were  bitterly  as- 
sailed as  savoring  of  heresy;  their  methods  and  purposes  were 
alike  suspected;  and  any  challenge  of  an  old  long-accepted  idea 
was  likely  to  bring  a  punishment  that  was  swift  and  sure.  From 
the  middle  of  the  sixteenth  to  the  middle  of  the  seventeenth  cen- 
tury was  not  a  time  when  new  ideas  were  at  a  premium  anywhere 
in  western  Europe.  It  was  essentially  a  period  of  reaction,  and 
periods  of  reaction  are  not  favorable  to  intellectual  progress.  It 
was  into  this  century  of  reaction  that  modern  scientific  inquiry 
and  reasoning,  itself  another  form  of  expression  of  the  intellectual 
attitudes  awakened  by  the  work  of  the  humanistic  scholars  of  the 
Itahan  Renaissance,  made  its  first  claim  for  a  hearing. 

In  1543  a  Bohemian  church  canon  and  physician  by  the  name 
of  Nicholas  Copernicus  published  his  De  Revolutionihus  Orhium 
Celestium,  in  which  he  set  forth  the  explanation  of  the  universe 


208        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

which  we  now  know.  At  first  Copernicus'  work  attracted  but 
little  attention.  An  Italian  Dominican  by  the  name  of  Giordano 
Bruno  (i  548-1 600),  deeply  impressed  by  the  new  theory,  set  forth 
in  Latin  and  Italian  the  far-reaching  and  majestic  implications 
of  such  a  theory  of  creation,  and  was  burned  at  the  stake  at 
Rome  for  his  pains.  A  Dane,  Tycho  Brahe,  after  twenty-one. 
years  of  careful  observation  of  the  heavens,  showed  Aristotle  to 
be  wrong  in  many  particulars.  His  observations  of  the  comet 
of  1577  led  him  to  conclude  that  the  theory  of  crystalline  spheres 
was  impossible,  and  that  the  common  view  of  the  time  as  to  their 
nature  was  absurd.  In  1609  a  German  by  the  name  of  Johann 
Kepler  (1571-1630),  using  the  records  of  observations  which 
Tycho  Brahe  had  accumulated  and  applying  them  to  the  planet 
Mars,  proved  the  truth  of  the  Copernican  theory  and  framed 
his  famous  three  laws  for  planetary  motion. 

Finally  an  Italian,  Galileo  Galilei,  a  professor  at  the  University 
of  Pisa,  developing  a  telescope  that  would  magnify  to  eight  diam- 
eters, discovered  Jupiter's  satellites  and  Saturn's  rings.  The 
story  of  his  discovery  of  the  satellites  of  Jupiter  is  another  interest- 
ing illustration  of  the  careful  scientific  reasoning  of  these  early 
workers  (R.  206).  Gahleo  also  made  a  number  of  discoveries  in 
physics,  through  the  use  of  new  scientific  methods,  which  com- 
pletely upset  the  teaching  of  the  Aristotelians,  and  made  the 
most  notable  advances  in  mechanics  since  the  days  of  Archimedes. 

Finally  the  English  scholar  Newton  (1642-1728),  in  his  Prin- 
cipia  (1687),  settled  permanently  all  discussions  as  to  the  Coper- 
nican theory  by  his  wonderful  mathematical  studies.  He  dem- 
onstrated mathematically  the  motions  of  the  planets  and  comets, 
proved  Kepler's  laws  to  be  true,  explained  gravitation  and  the 
tides,  made  clear  the  nature  of  light,  and  reduced  dynamics  to  a 
science.  So  far-reaching  in  its  importance  was  the  scientific  work 
of  Newton  that  Pope's  couplet  seems  exceedingly  applicable: 

Nature  and  Nature's  laws  lay  hid  in  night; 
God  said,  "Let  Newton  be,"  and  there  was  light. 

The  sixteenth  century  thus  marks  the  rise  of  modern  scientific 
inquiry,  and  the  beginnings  of  the  study  of  modem  science.  The 
number  of  scholars  engaged  in  the  study  was  still  painfully  small, 
and  the  reUgi9us  prejudice  against  which  they  worked  was  strong 
and  powerful,  but  in  the  work  of  these  few  men  we  have  not  only 
the  beginnings  of  the  study  of  modern  astronomy,  physics,  chem- 
istry, metallurgy,  medicine,  anatomy,  physiology,  and  natural 


THE  RISE  OF  SCIENTIFIC  INQUIRY       209 

^     history,  but  also  the  begmnings  of  a  group  of  men,  destined  in 
time  to  increase  greatly  in  number,  who  could  see  straight,  and 
who  sought  facts  regardless  of  where  they  might  lead  and  what 
preconceived  ideas  they  might  upset.     How  deeply  the  future  of 
-    civilization  is  indebted  to  such  men,  men  who  braved  social  ostra- 
A    cism  and  often  the  wrath  of  the  Church  as  well,  for  the,  to  them, 
V,  precious  privilege  of  seeing  things  as  they  are,  we  are  not  likely  to 
T  over-estimate.     In  time  their  work  was  destined  to  reach  the 
{  schools,  and  to  materially  modify  the  character  of  all  education. 
Human  reason  in  the  investigation  of  nature.    To  the  English 
statesman  and  philosopher,  Francis  Bacon,  more  than  to  any  one 
else,  are  we  indebted  for  the  proper  formulation  and  statement  of 
this  new  scientific  method.     Though  not  a  scientist  himself,  he 
has  often  been  termed  "the  father  of  modern  science."    By 
showing  how  to  learn  from  nature  herself  he  turned  the  Re- 
naissance energy  into  a  new  direction,  and  made  a  revolutionary 
break  with  the  disputations  and  deductive  logic  of  the  Aristo- 
telian scholastics  which  had  for  so  long  dominated  university  in- 
struction. 

v^  In  formulating  the  new  method  he  first  pointed  out  the  defects 
"  Ca  of  the  learning  of  his  tune,  which  he  classified  under  the  head  of 
J^  "distempers,"  three  in  number,  and  as  follows: 

*  "^i.  Fantastic  learning:y  Alchemy,  magic,  miracles,  old-wives'  tales, 
\^  credulities,  superstitions,  pseudo-science,  and  impostures  of  all  sorts 
1^^  ^  inherited  from  an  ignorant  past,  and  now  conserved  as  treasures  of 
r^'- knowledge. 

v^""      2.  Contentious  learning:  The  endless  disputations  of  the  Scholastics 
^  "^  about  questions  which  had  lost  their  significance,  deductive  in  char- 
acter, not  based  on  any  observation,  not  aimed  primarily  to  arrive  at 
^_.  truth,  "fruitful  of  controversy,  and  barren  of  effect." 
S^     3.  Delicate  learning:  The  new  learning  of  the  humanistic  Renais- 
j  sance,  verbal  and  not  real,  stylish  and  polished  but  not  socially  impor- 
'  tant,  and  leading  to  nothing  except  a  mastery  of  itself. 

L  Q^    As  an  escape  from  these  three  types  of  distempers,  which  weU 

^characterized  the  three  great  stages  in  human  progress  from  the 

3  V  sixth   to   the  fifteenth  centuries.  Bacon  offered  the  inductive 

v*^  method,  by  means  of  which  men  would  be  able  to  distinguish  true 

C  ''  from  false,  learn  to  see  straight,  create  useful  knowledge,  and  fill 

\  .^  in  the  great  gaps  in  the  learning  of  the  time  by  actually  working 

N^out  new  knowledge  from  the  unknown.     The  collecting,  organiz- 

V  S  ing,  comparing,  questioning,  and  inferring  spirit  of  the  humanistic 

r^  J  revival  he  now  turned  in  a  new  direction  by  organizing  and  f ormu- 


210        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

lating  for  the  work  a  new  Organum  to  take  the  place  of  the  old 
Organon  of  Aristotle.  In  Book  I  he  sets  forth  some  of  the  difl&cul- 
ties  (R.  208)  with  which  those  who  try  new  experiments  or  work 
out  new  methods  of  study  have  to  contend  from  partisans  of  old 
ideas. ) 

The  No-iiuni.Organum  showed  the  means  of  escapgjrom  the  er- 
rors of  two  thousand  years  by  means  of  a  new  method  of  thinking 
and  work.  His  true  service-lo  science  lay  in  the  completeness  of 
his  analysis  of  the  inductive  process,  and  his  declaration  that 
those  who  wish  to  arrjye  at  useful  discoveries  must  travel  by  that 
road.     As  Macaulay  well  says,  in  his  essay  on  Bacon: 

He  was  not  the  maker  of  that  road;  he  was  not  the  discoverer  of  that 
road ;  he  was  not  the  person  who  first  surveyed  and  mapped  that  road. 
But  he  was  the  person  who  first  called  the  public  attention  to  an  inex- 
haustible mine  of  weaTth-which  had  been  utterly  neglected,  and  which 
was  aci;essible  by  that  road  alone. 

To  stimulate  men  to  the  discovery  of  useful  truth,  to  turn  the 
energies  of  mankind  —  even  slowly  —  from  assumption  and  dis- 
putation to  patient  experimentation,  and  to  give  an  impress  to 
human  thinking  which  it  has  retained  for  centuries,  is,  as  Macau- 
lay  well  says,  "the  rare  prerogative  of  a  few  imperial  spirits^ 
Macaulay's  excellent  summary  of  the  importance  of  Bg^im'^ 
work  (R.  209)  is  well  worth  reading  at  this  point. 

The  new  method  in  the  hands  of  subsequent  workers.  By  the 
middle  of  the  seventeenth  century  many  important  advances  had 
been  made  in  many  different  lines  of  scientific  work.  In  the  two 
centuries  between  1450  and  1^50,  the  foundations  of  modern 
mathematics  and  mechanics  had  been  laid.  At  the  beginning  of 
the  period  Arabic  notation  and  the  early  books  of  Euclid  were 
about  all  that  were  taught;  at  its  end  the  western  world  had 
worked  out  decimals,  syrabolic  algebra,  much  of  plane  a,nd  spher- 
ical trigonometry,  mechanics,  logarithms  (1614)  and  conic  sec- 
tions (1637),  and  was  soon  to  add  the  calculus  (1667-87).  Mer- 
cator  had  pubHshed  the  map  of  the  world  (1569)  which  has  ever 
since  borne  his  name,  and  the  Gregorian  calendar  had  been  intro- 
duced (1572).  The  barometer,  thermometer,  air-pump,  pendu- 
lum clock,  and  the  telescope  had  come  into  use  in  the  period.  Al- 
chemy had  passed  over  into  modern  chemistry ;  and  the  astrologer 
was  finding  less  and  less  to  do  as  the  astronomer  took  his  place. 
The  English  Hippocrates,  Thomas  Sydenham  (1624-89),  during 
this  period  laid  the  foundations  of  modern  medical  study,  and  the. 


THE  RISE  OF  SCIENTIFIC  INQUIRY       211 


SCIENCE 

Greece      Alex.  Rome 

S   2     a     2      2             2     2 

Middle  Ages                                  Modern  Times 

iil§i§§liiiliii 

GEOGRAPHY 

.^ 

_ 

1  - 

■__    i 

I          A^^hemy     '       ja..   •= 

MATHEMATICS 

^Jp 

L 
r 

..-i=^"  ; 

ASTRONOMY 

_ 

PHYSICS 

CHEMISTRY 

MEDICINE 

H 

r^ 

ANATOMY 

tM 

PHYSIOLOGY 

rl 

NATL.  HISTORY 

— 

1 

PSYCHOLOGY 

- 

_— 

^ 

PHILOSOPHY 

3L 

J3=^lSiii 

Fig.  44.  The  Loss  and  Recovery  of  the  Sciences 

Each  short  horizontal  line  indicates  the  life-span  of  a  very  distinguished  scholar  in 
the  science.  Mohammedan  scientists  have  not  been  included.  The  relative  neg- 
lect or  ignorance  of  a  science  has  been  indicated  by  the  depth  of  the  shading.  The 
great  loss  to  civilization  caused  by  the  barbarian  inroads  and  the  hostile  attitude  of 
the  early  Church  is  evident. 


microscope  was  applied  to  the  study  of  organic  fonns.  Modem 
ideas  as  to  light  and  optics  and  gases,  and  the  theory  of  gravita- 
tion, were  about  to  be  setlorth.  All  these  advances  had  been 
made  during  the  century  following  the  epoch-making  labors  of 
Copernicus,  the  fixst  modern  scientificjn^n_tojnE|J^aiLimpression 
on  th.e^ thinking  of  mankind. 

Accompanying  this  new  scientific  work  there  arose,  among  a 
few  men  in  each  of  the  western  EuLri:)pean  countries,  an  interest  in 
scientific  studies  such  as  the  world  had  not  witnessed  since  the 
days  ofthe  Alexandrian  Greek.  This  interest  found  expression  in 
the  organization  of  scientific  societies,  wholly  outside  the  univer- 
sities of~tEe  time,  for  the  reporting  of  methods  and  results,  and 
for  the  mingling  together  in  sympathetic  companionship  of  these 
seekers  after  new  truth. 

After  1650  the  advance  of  science  was  rapid.  The  spirit  of 
mqdern  iii^ny,  which  irTthe  sixteenth  century  had  animated  but 
a  few  minds,  by  the  middle  of  the  seventeenth  had  extended  to  all 
the  principal  countries  of  Europe.  The  striking  results  obtained 
during  the  seventeenili_century  revealed  the  vast  field  waiting  to 
be  explored,  and  filled  many  independent  modern-type  scholars 
with  an  enthusiasm  for  research  in  the  new  domain  of  science. 
By  the  close  of  the  eighteenth  century  the  main  outlines  of  most 
of  the  modern  sciences  had  been  estabhshed. 


Is 


212        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

1.  Show  that  the  rise  of  scientific  inquiry  was  but  another  manifestation 
of  the  same  inquiring  spirit  which  had  led  to  the  recovery  of  the  ancient 
Hteratures  and  history. 

2.  Show  that  it  would  be  possible  largely  to  determine  the  character  of  a 
civilization,  if  one  knew  only  the  prevailing  ideas  and  conceptions  as  to 

•^       scientific  and  religious  matters. 
t   3.  Of  which  type  was  the  reasoning  of  Galileo  as  to  Jupiter's  sateUites? 

Show  that  the  three  "distempers"  described  by  Bacon  characterize  the 
three  great  stages  in  human  progress  from  the  sixth  to  the  fifteenth 
centuries. 

How  do  you  explain  the  long  rejection  of  the  new  sciences  by  the  univer- 
sities? 


SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  selections  are  repro- 
duced: 

203.  Macaulay:  Attitude  of  the  Ancients  toward  Scientific  Inquiry. 

204.  Franck:  The  Credulity  of  Mediasval  People. 

205.  Copernicus:  How  he  arrived  at  the  theory  he  set  forth. 

206.  Brewster:  Galileo's  Discovery  of  the  Satellites  of  Jupiter. 

207.  Inquisition:  The  Abjuration  of  Galileo. 

208.  Bacon:  On  Scientific  Progress. 

209.  Macaulay:  The  Importance  of  Bacon's  Work. 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

Ball,  W.  R.  R.    History  of  Mathematics  at  Cambridge. 
*Libby,  Walter.    An  Introduction  to  the  History  of  Science. 
Ornstein,  Martha.     Role  of  the  Scientific  Societies  in  the  Seventeenth 
Century. 
*Routledge,  Robert.    A  Popular  History  of  Science. 
*Sedgwick,  W.  T.  and  Tyler,  H.  W.    A  Short  History  of  Science, 
*White,  A.  D.     History  of  the  Warfare  of  Science  with  Theology,  2  vols. 
Wordsworth,  Christopher,     Scholce  Academicce;  Studies  at  the  English 
Universities  in  the  Eighteenth  Century. 


CHAPTER  XVII 
THE  NEW  SCIENTIFIC  METHOD  AND  THE  SCHOOLS 

The  rise  of  realism  in  education.  As  will  be  remembered  from 
our  study  of  the  educational  results  of  the  Revival  of  Learning 
(chapter  xi),  the  new  schools  established,  in  the  reaction  against 
mediaevahsm,  to  teach  pure  Latin  and  Greek,  in  time  became 
formal  and  hfeless  (p.  150),  and  their  aim  came  to  be  ahnost  en- 
tirgly-that  of  impajiing  a  mastgiy  of  the  Cicergnian  style,  both  in 
writing  and  in  speech.  This-idea,  first  clearlyLinau^rated  by 
Stuntt-at  Strassburg  (R.  137),  had  now  become  fixed,  and  in  its 
extreme  is  illustrated  by  the  teachings  of  the  Jesuit  Campion  at 
giague  (R.  146) .  As  a  reactiori  against  this  extreme  positionpf 
the  humanistic  scholars  there  arose,  during  the  sixieenth  century, 
and  as  a  further  expression  of  the  new  critical  spirit  awakened  by 
the  Revival  of  Learning,  a  demand  for  a  type  of  education  which 
would  make  truth  rather  than  beauty,  and  the  realities  of  the  life 
of  the  time  rather  than  the  beauties  of  a  life  of  Roman  days,  the 
aiiii,and  purpose  of  education.  (This  new  spirit  became  known  as 
RQalism2)was  contemporaneous  with  the  rise  of  scientific^in^juiry, 
anJwas  an  expression  of  a  similar, dissatisfaction  with  the  learning, 
ofjjje  time.  As  applied  to  education  this  new  spirit  may  be  said 
to  have  manifested  itself  in  thrcie  different  stages,  as  follows: 

1.  Humanistic  realism.     ^ 

2.  Sbciaf  realism. 

3.  ^ense  realism. 

We  will  explain  each  of  these,  briefly,  in  order. 

I.  HUMANISTIC  REALISM 

A  new  aim  in  instruction.  Humanistic  readgjn  represents  the 
beginning  of  the  reaction  against  form  and  s^le  and  in  favor  of 
ideas  and  content.  The  humanistic  realists  were  in  agreement 
with  the  classical  humanists  £Eaf  the  old  classical  literatures  and 
the  Bible,  contained  all  that  was  important  in  the  education  of 
youth.  The  ancieat  Uteratures,  they  held,  presented  "not  only 
the  widest  product  of  human  intelligence,  but  practically  all  that 
was  worthy  of  man's  attention."  The  two  groups  differed,  how- 
ever, in  that  the  classical  humanists  conceived  the  aim  of  educa- 


214        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


tion  to  be  the  mastery  of  the  vocabulary  and  style  of  Cicero,  and 
the  production  of  a  new  race  of  Roman  youths  Tor  a  revived  Latin^ 
scholarly  world,  while  the  new  humanistic  realists  wanted  to  use 
the"^d  literatures  as  a  means  to  a  new  end  —  that  of  teaching 
knowledge  that  would  be  useful  in  the  world  in  which  they  lived. 

Exponents  of  humanistic  realism.     The  Dutch  internaLtimia4^ 
scholar  Erasmus  (i466?-i536)  (p.  147),  the  Frenchman  Rabelais 
(1483-1553),  and  the  English  poet  Milton  (1608-74)  stand  as  the 
clearest  representatives  of  this  new  humanistic  realism. 

Erasmus  had  clearly  distinguished  between  the  education  of 
words  and  the  education  of  t"Hings,  had  pointed  out  the  ease  with 
which  real  truth  is^Iea^negl  and  retained,  and  had  urged  the  study 
of  the  confent  rather  than  the  form  of  the  ancient  authors. 

The  French  non-conforming  monk,  cure,  physician,  and  uni- 
versity scholar,  Francois  Rabelais,  in  his  satirical  Life  of  Gargan- 
tua  (1535)  and  The  Heroic  Deeds  of  Pantagruel  (1533)  had  set 
forth,  even  more  clearly Tthe  idea  of  obtaining  from  a  study  of  the 
aiicient  authors  (R.  210)  knowledge  that  would  be  useful.  He  ridi- 
culed the  old  scholastic  learning,  set  forth 
the  idea  of  using  the  old  classics  for  realistic 
as  well  as  humanistic  ends,  and  also  advo- 
cated physical,  moral,  social,  and  religious 
education  in  the  spirit  of  the  best  writers 
and  teachers  of  the  Italian  Renaissance.- 
His  book  was  extensively  read  and  had 
some  influence  in  shaping  thinking,  though 
Rabelais's  importance  in  the  history  of  edu- 
cation lies  rather  in  his  influence  on  later 
educational  thinkers  than  on  the  life  of  his 
time. 

Perhaps  the  ckarest  example  of  human- 
istic realism  is  found  in  the  writings  of  the 
EngHsh  poet  and  humanitarian,  John  Milton.  His  Tractate  on 
Education  (1644)  was  extensively  read,  and  was  influential  in 
shaping  educational  practice  in  the  non-confoijjiist  secondary 
academies  which  arose  a  little  later  in  England.  Still  later  his 
ideari'ndirectly  somewhat  influenced  American  development. 

Milton  first  gives  us  an  excellent  statement  of  the  new  religious- 
civic~aim  of  post-Reformation  education  (R.  211),  and  then 
points  out  the  defects,  of  the  existing  education,  whereby  boys 
''•spend  seven  or  eight  years  merely  in  scraping  together  so  much 


Fig.  45.  Francois 
Rabelais  (i  483-1 553) 


SCIENTIFIC  METHOD  AND  THE  SCHOOLS    215 

miserable  Latine  and  Greek,  as  might  be  learnt  otherwise  easily 
and  delightfully  in  one  year."  He  then  presents  his  plan  for  "a 
complea4;  and  generous  Education"  for  ''noble  and  gentle 
youths,"  and  tells  "how  all  thismay  be  done  between  twelye  and 
one  and  twenty,  less  time  than  is  now  bestowed  in  pure  trifling 
at  Grajcffiaar  and  Sophistry."  The  course  of  study  he  outUnes 
(R.  212)  is  enoraious.  Aside,  though,  from  its  impossibility  of  ac- 
complishnient  except  by  a  superior  lew,  Milton's  plan  is  thoroughly 
representative  of  the  new  humanistic- 
reaJistic  point  of  view — that  is,  that  edu- 
cation should  impart  useful  information, 
though  the  information  as  Milton  con- 
ceived it  was  to  be  drawn  almost  entirely 
from  the  bo_oki  of  the  ancieiits. 

Educational  results  of  humanistic  realr 
i^m.  The  importance  of  hurnaiiistic  real- 
ism in  the  history  of  education  Ues  largely 
in  that  it  was  the  first  of  a  series  of  reac- 
^^A3  that  led  later  to  sense-reahsm  — 
that  is,  to  the  study  of  science  and  the 
application  of  scientific  method  in  the 
schools. 

In  England  it  possesses  still  larger  im- 
portance. Milton  had  called  his  insti- 
tution an  ''Acg4emy."  After  the  restoration  of  the  Stuarts 
(Charles  11,  1660),  some  two  thousand  non-conforming  clergy- 
men were  "dispossessed"  by  the  Act  of  Conlormity  (1662; 
R.  166),  and  soon  "alter  this  the  children  of  Non-Conformists 
were  excluded  from  the  gramniar  schools  and  universities. 
Many  of  these  clergymen  no^  turned  to  teaching  as  a  means  of 
earning  a  liYclillOod  and  serving  their  people,  and  the  ideas  of  the 
non-conformist  Milton  were  influential  in  turning  the  schools 
thus  established  even  further  toward^the  study  of  useful  sut^iects. 
Many  of  the  new  schools  offered  instruction  in  the  modern 
langua,ges,  logic,  rhetoric,  ethics,  geography,  astronomy,  algebra, 
geojuetry,  trigonometry,  surveying,  navi^tion,  history,  oratoiy, 
economics,  and  natural  and  moral  philosophy,  as  well  as  the  old 
classic^  subjects.  All  teaching,  tbo,  was  done  in  EngU§li,  and  the 
study  of  Enghsh  language  and  literatuxe  was  emphasized.  This 
made  these  non-conformist  academies  in  many  respects  superior 
to  the  older  Latin  grainmar  spools.    After  the  enactment  of  the 


Fig.  46.  John  Milton 
(1608-74) 


l^ 


2l6       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

Toleration  Act,  in  1689,  these  schools  were  allowed  to  incorporate 
and  were  gradually  absorbed  into  the  existing  Latin  grammar- 
school  system  of  England,  but  unfortunately  without  prodiiang 
much  change  in  the  character  of  these  older  institutions. 

The  idea  of  ofiferijjg  instruction  in  these  new  studies  was  in 
time  carried  to  America,  where  better  results  were  obtained.  At 
first  a  few  of  the  subjects,  such  as  the  mathematical  studies,  sur- 
veying, navigation,  and  ^^nglish,  were  introduced  into  the  exi^ing_ 
Latin  grammar  or  other  schools  of  secondary  grade.  Especially 
was  this  true  in  the  colonies  south  of  New  England.  After  1751, 
and  especially  after  about  1780,  distinct  Academies  arose  in  the 
United  States  (chapter  xviii),  whose  purpose  was  to  offer  instruc- 
tion in  all  these  new  subjects  of  study.  From  these  our  mqdeui 
high  schools  have  been  derived. 

II.  SOCIAL  REALISM 

Montaigne  and  Locke.    Social  realism  represents  a  still  further 
reaction  away  from  the  humajiistic  schools.     It  was  the  natural 
reaction  of  practical  men  of  the  new  world 
against  axtype  of  educ^^tion  that  tended 
to  perpetuate  the  pedantry  of  an  earlier 
age,  by  devoting  its  energies  to  the  pro- 
duction of  the  scholar  and  professional 
man  to  the  neglect  of  the  man  of  affairs. 
The  social  realists  were  small  in  number, 
but  powerful  because  of  their  important 
social  connections  and  wealth,  and  they 
//"ISiW^^i^^^^  n    ^^^^  very  determined  to  have  an  educa- 
/     M  '/  lv?^^3^/r  I  /  /    tion  suited  to  their  needs,  even  if  they  had 
to  create  it*  themselves  (R.  213).     The 

„  ,,  French  nobleman,  scholar,  author,  and 

Fig.  47.   Michel  de        .  .      ^         t      j  tvt     ^  •         /  ^ 

Montaigne  (1533-92)      civic  officer.  Lord  Montaigne  (1533-92), 

and  the  English  philosopher,  John  Locke 

(163  2- 1 704),  were  the  clearest  exponents  of  this  new  point  of 

view,  though  it  found  expression  in  the  writings  of  many  others. 

Each  declared  for  a  practical,  useful  type  of  education  for  the 

young  boy  who  was  to  live  the  life  of  a  gentleman  in  the  world 

of  affairs/) 

Neither  had  any  sympathy   with  the  colleges  and  grammar 

schools  of  the  time  (R.  214),  and  both  rejected  the  school  for  the 

private  tutor.    This  tutor  must  be  selected  with  great  care,  and 


Fig.  48.  John  Locke 

( 163 2-1 704 ) 


SCIENTIFIC  METHOD  AND  THE  SCHOOLS    217 

first  of  all  must  be  a  well-bred  gentleman  —  a  man,  as  Montaigne 
says,  "who  has  rather  a  well-made  than  a  well-lilled  head"  (R. 
215).  V Locke  cautions  that  "one  fit  to  educate  and  form  the 
Mind  of  a  young  Gentleman  is  not  every  where  to  be  found,"  and 
of  the  common  type  of  teacher  he  asks, 
"When  such  an  one  has  empty 'd  out 
into  his  Pupil  all  the  Latin  and  Logick  he 
has  brought  from  the  University,  will 
that  Furniture  make  him  a  fine  Gentle- 
man?" (R.  216). 

V  Both  condemn  the  school  training  of 
their  time,  and  both  urge  that  the  tutor 
train  the  judgment  and  the  understanding 
rather  than  the  memory.  To  impart  good 
manners  rather  than  mere  information, 
and  to  train  for  life  in  the  world  rather 
than  for  the  life  of  ascholar,  seem  to  both 
of  fundamental  importance  in  the  educa- 
tionofaboy.  "The  great  world,"  says 
Montaigne,  "is  the  mirror  wherein  we  are  to  behold  ourselves. 
In  short,  I  would  have  this  to  be  the  book  my  young  gentleman 
should  study  with  the  most  attention."  "Latin  and  Learning," 
says  Locke,  "make  all  the  Noise;  and  the  main  Stress  is  laid  upon 
Proficigncy  in  Things  a  great  Part  whereof  belong  not  to  a  Gentle- 
man's CaUing;  which  is  to  have  the  Knowledge  of  a  Man  of 
Business,  a  Carriage  suitable  to  liis_B.aiik,  and  to  be  eminent  and 
useful  to  his  Cojintry,  according  to  his  Station  "  (R.  216).  Both 
emphasized  the  importance  of  travel  abroad  as  an  important 
factor  in  the  education  of  a  gentleman. 

Their  place  in  the  history  of  education.  Both  Montaigne  and 
Locke  were  concerned  alone  with  the  education  of  the  sons  of 
gentlemen,  individuals  now  coming  rapidly  into  prominence  to 
dispute  place  irTthe  world  of  affairs  with  the  higher  nobility  on 
the  one  hand'^and  the  clergy  on  the  other.  With  the  education  of 
any  other  class  Montaigne  never  concerned  himself.  Locke 
was  extensively  read  by  the  gentry  of  England,  as  expressive 
of  the  best  current  practice  of  their  class,  and  his  ideas  as  to 
education  were  also  of  some  influence  in  shaping  the  ins^uc- 
tion  of  the  non-conformist  teachers  in  the  academies  there.  His 
place  in  the  history^of  education  is  also  of  some  importance,  as 
we  shall  point  out  later,  for  the  disciplinary  theory  of  education 


2i8        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

which  he  set  forth.  Still  more,  Locke  later  exerted  a  deep 
influence  on  the  writings  of  Rousseau  (chapter  xxi),  and  hence 
helped  materially  to  shape  modern  educational  theory. 

The  new  schools  for  the  sons  of  the  gentry.  Both  Montaigne 
and  Lockfc,  in  their  emphasis  on  the  importance  of  a  practical  edu- 
cation for  the  social  and  political  demands  of  a  gentleman  con- 
cerned with  the  affairs  of  the  modern  world,  represent  a  still  fur- 
ther reaction  against  the  humanistic  schools  of  the  time  than  did 
the  humanistic  realists  whom  we  have  just  considered.  Still 
more,  both  are  expressive  of  the  attitude  of  the  nobility  and  gen- 
try of  the  time,  who  had  almost  deserted  the  schools  as  pedantic 
institutions  of  Httle  value.  Francewas  then  the  great  country  of 
Europe,  and  French  language,  French  political  ideas,  French 
manners,  and  French  tutors  found  their  way  into  all  neighboring 
lands.  A  new  social  and  political  ideal  was  erected  —  that  of  the 
polished  man  of  the  world,  who  could  speak  French,  had  traveled, 
knew  history  and  poHtics,  law  and  geography,  heraldry  and  gene-, 
alogy,  some  mathematics  and  physics  with  their  applications, 
could  use  the  sword  and  ride,  was  adept  in  games  and  dancing, 
and  was  skilled  inlhe  practical  affair^  of  hf e. 

III.  SENSE  REALISM         '    ^ 

The  new  educational  aims  of  this  group.  This  represented  a 
still  further  and  more  important  step  in  advance  than  either  of 
the  preceding.  In  a  very  direct  way  sense  realism  in  education 
was  an  outgrowth  of  the  organizing  work  of  Francis  Bacon.  Its 
aim  was: 

y  (i)  To  apply  the  same  inductive  method  formulated  by  Bacon  for 
V  the  sciences  to  the  work  of  education,  with  a  view  to  org^izing 
a  generaT  method  which  would  greatly  simplify  the  instructional 
process,  reduce  educational  work  to  an  organized  system,  and  in 
consequence  effect  a  great  saving  of  time;  and 
(2)  To  replace  the  instruction  in  Latin_by  instruction  in  the  vernacu- 
laj;;,  and  to  substitute  new  scientific  and  social  studies,  deemed 
of  greater  value  for"a  modern  world,  for  the  excessive  devotion 
to  linguistic  studies.  " 

The  sixteenth  century  had  been  essentially  a  period  of  criticism  in 
education,  and  the  leading  thinkers  on  education,  as  in  other  lines 
of  intellectual  activity,  were  not  in  the  schools.  In  the  seven:: 
teenth  century^  we  come  to  a  new  group  of  men  who  attempted  to 
think  out  and  work  out  in  practice  the  ideas  advanced  by  the 


SCIEMIFIC  METHOD  AND  THE  SCHOOLS     219 

critics  of  the  preceding  period.  In  the  seventeenth  century  we 
have,  in  consequence,  the  first  serious  attempt  to  formulate  an 
educjLtional  method  since  the  days  of  the  Athenian  Greeks  and 
the  treatise  of  Quintilian. 

The  possibility  of  formulating  an  educational  method  that 
would  simplify  the  educational  process  and  save  time  in  in- 
struction, appealed  to  a  number  of  thinkers,  in  different  lands. 
THs  group  of  thinkers,  due  to  their  new  methods  of  attack  and 
thought,  the  German  historian  of  education,  Karl  von  Raumer^^ 
has  called  Innovators.  The  chief  pedagogical  ideas  of  the  Innova- 
tors were : 

1.  That  education  should  proceed  from  the  simple  to  the  complex, 
and  the  concrete  to  the  abstract. 

2.  That  things  should  come  before  rules. 

3.  That  stu^nts  should  be  taught  to  analyze,  rather  than  to  con- 
struct. 

4.  That  each  studenL  should  be  taught  to  investigate  for  himself, 
rather  than  to  accept  or  depend  upon  authorityf 

5.  That  only  that  should  be  memorized  which  is  clearly  understood 
and  of  real  value.  

6.  That  restraint  and  coercion  should  be  replaced  by  interest  in  the 
studies  taught. 

7.  That  the  vemaciilar  should  be  used  as  the  mediumfor  all  instruc- 
tion. " 

8.  That  the  study  of  real  things  should  precede  the  study  of  words 
aboirt  things.  ' 

9.  That  the  order  and  coursej)f  Nature  be  discovered,  and  that  a 
method  of  teaching  based  on  this  then  be  worked  out. 

10.  That  physical  eduaition  should  be  introduced  for  the  sake  of 
health,  and  not  merely  to  teach  gentlemanly  sports. 

11.  That  all  should  be  provided  with  the  opportunity  for  an  education^ 
in  the  elements  of  knowledge.    This  to  be  in  the  vernacular. 

12.  That  Latin  and  Greek  be  taught  only  to  those  likely  to  complete 
an  education,  and  then  through  the  medium  of  the  mother  tongue. 

13.  That  a  uniform  and  scientific  method  of  instruction  could  be 

worked  out,  which  would  reduce  ediication  to  a  science  and  serve 
as  a  guide  for  teachers  everywhere.      ~ 

The  Englishman,  Francis  Bacon,  whom  we  have  previously  con- 
^dered;  the  German,  Wolfgang  Ratichius  (or  Ratke);  and  the 
Miirayian  bishop  and  teacher,  Johann  Amos  Comenius,  stand  as 
perhaps  the  clearest  examples  of  this  organizing  tendency  in  edu- 
cation.    Ratke  and  Comenius  will  be  considered  here  as  types. 

Wolfgang  Ratke.  Bacon  had  believed  that  the  new  scientific 
knowledge  should  be  Tncorgorated  into  the  instruction  of  the 


220       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

schools,  and  had  suggested,  in  his  Advancement  of  Learning  (1603- 
05),  a  broader  course  of  study  for  them,  and  better  facilities  for 
scientific  investigation  and  teaching.  While  Bacon  was  not  a 
teacher  and  did  not  write  specifically  on  school  instruction,  his 
writings  nevertheless  deeply  influenced  many  of  those  who  fol- 
lowed his  thinking. 

The  first  writer  to  apply  Bacon's  ideas  to  education  and  to 
attempt  to  evolve  a  new  method  and  a  new  course  of  instruction 
was  a  German,  by  the  name  of  Wolfgang  Ratke  (i 571-1635). 
While  studying  in  England  he  had  read  Bacon's  Advancement  oj 
Learning,  and  from  Bacon's  suggestions  Ratke  tried  to  work  out 
a  new  method  of  instruction. 

In  161 7  Ratke  published,  in  Leipzig,  his  Methodus  Novaj  which 
was  the  pioneer  work  on  school  method,  and  is  Ratke's  chief 
claim  to  mention  here.  In  this  he  laid  down  the  fundamental 
rules  for  teaching,  as  he  had  thought  them  out.  They  were  as 
follows : 

x^i.  The  order  of  Nature  was  to  be  sought  and  followed. 
\  2.  One  thing  at  a  time,  and  that  mastered  thoroughly. 
y<  3.  Much  repetition  to  insure  retention. 

J'  4.  Use  of  the  mother  tongue  for  all  instruction,  and  the  languages 
to  be  taught  through  it. 

>  5.  Everything  to  be  taught  without  constraint.     The  teacher  to 

teach,  and  the  scholars  to  keep  order  and  discipline. 
J^    6.  No  learning  by  heart.     Much  questioning  and  understanding. 
^  7.  Uniformity  in  books  and  methods  a  necessity. 
^  8.  Knowledge  of  things  to  precede  words  about  things. 

>  9.  Individual  experience  and  contact  and  inquiry  to  replace  author- 

ity. 

We  see  here  the  essentials  of  the  Baconian- ideas,  as  well  as  the 
foreshadowings  of  many  other  aiibsequent  reforms  in  teaching 
method.  Ap'      UT   Wi?.^ 

Johann  Amos  Comenius.  We  now  reach  not  only  the  greatest 
representative  of  sense  realism,  both  in  theory  and  practice,  be- 
fore the  latter  part  otthe  eighteenth  century,  but  also  one  of  the 
commanding  figures  in  the  history  of  education.  Comenius  was 
born  at  Nivnitz,  in  Moravia,  in  1592.  As  a  member,  pastor,  and 
later  bishop  of  the  Moravian  church,  and  as  a  follower  of  John 
Huss,  he  suffered  greatly  in  the  Catholic-Protestant  warfare 
which  raged  over  his  native  land  during  the  period  of  the  Thirty 
Years'  War.  His  home  twice  plundered,  his  books  and  manu- 
scripts twice  burned,  his  wife  and  children  murdered,  and  himseK 


SCIENTIFIC  METHOD  AND  THE  SCHOOLS    221 

at  times  a  fugitive  and  later  an  exile,  Comenius  gave  his  long  life 
to  the  advancement  of  the  interests  of  mankind  through  religion 
and  learning.  Driven  from  his  home  and  country,  he  became  a 
scholar  of  the  world. 

While  a  student  at  the  University  of  Nassau,  at  the  age  of 
twenty,  he  read  and  was  deeply^impressed  by  the  "Address  "  of 
Ra^te.  Bacon's  Novum  Organum,  which  appeared  when  he  was 
twen^reight,  made  a  still  deeper  impression  upon  him.  He  seems 
to  have  been  familiar  also  with  the  writings  of  the  educational  re- 
formers  of  his,  time  in  all  Europ>ean  lands.  He  traveled  exten- 
sively, and  maintained  a  large  correspondence  with  the  scholars  of 
Kir  time. 

Comenius  and  educational  method.  While  teaching  at  Lissa, 
in  Poland,  Comeiuus  had  formulated  for  himself  the  principles 
underlying  school  instruction,  as  he  saw  it,  in  a  lengthy  book 
which  he  called  The  Great  Didactic.  The  title  page  (R.  218)  and 
the  table  of  contents  (R.  219)  will  give  an  idea  as  to  its  scope.  In 
this  work  Comenius  fonnylated  and  explained  his  two  funda- 
mental ideas,  namely,  that  all  instruction  must  be  carefully 
graded  and  arranged  to  follow  the  order  of  nature,  and  that,  in 
imparting  knowledge^to  children,  the  teacher  must  make  constant 
appeal  through  sense-perception  to  the  understanding  of  the 
child.  ]  We  have  here  the  fundamentaHdeas  of  Bacon  applied  to 
the  "School,  and  Comenius  stands  as  the  clearest  exponent  of  sense 
reaUsm  in  teaching  up  to  his  time,  and  for  more  than  a  centuiy 
afterward. 

Deeply  religious  by  nature  and  training,  Comenius  held  the 
Holy^criptures  to  contain  the  begmniiig  and  end  of  all  learning; 
to  know  God  aright  he  held  to  be  the  highest  aim;  and  with  true 
Protestanl  JervoL  he  contended  that  the  education  of  ever>'  hu- 
man being_was  a  necessity  if  mankind  was  to  enter  into  its  re- 
ligious inheritance,  and  piety,  virtue,  and  learning  were  to  be 
brought  to  their  fruition.  ^iJnlike^those  who  were  enthusiasts 
for  religious  education  only,  Comenius  saw  further,  and  held  an 
ideal  of  service  to  the  State  and  Church  here  below  for  which 
proper  training  was  needed.  Still  more,  he  believed  in  the  educa-^ 
tion  of  human  bein^  simply  because  they  were  human  beings, 
and  not  merely  for  salvation,  as  Luther  had  heldJ  Comenius 
was  the  first  to  formulate  a  practicable  school  me^od,  working 
along  the  new  lines  marked  out  by  Bacon. 

Comenius'  ideas  as  to  the  organization  of  schools.    In  his  Di- 


222        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

dactica  Magna  Comenius  divided  the  school  hfe  of  a  child  into 
four  great  divisions.  The  first  concerned  the  period  from  inlancy 
to  the  age  of  six,  which  he  called  The  Mother  School.  For  this 
period  he  wrote  The  School  of  Infancy  (1628),  a  book  intended 
primarily  for  parents,  and  one  of  such  deep  insight  and  funda- 
mental importance  that  parents  and  teachers  may  still  read  it 
with  interest  and  profit.  In  it  he  anticipated  many  of  the  ideas 
of  the  kindergarten  of  to-day.  The  next  division  was  The^^ernac-^ 
ular  School,  which  covered  the  period  from  the  ages  of  six  to 
twelve.  For  this  period  six  classes  were  to  be  provided,  and  the 
emphasis  was  to  be  on  the  mother  tpngue.  This  school  was  to  be 
for  all,  of  both  sexes,  and  in  it  the  basis  of  an  education  for  life 
was  to  be  given.  It  was  to  teach  its  pupils  to  read  and  write  the 
mother  tongue;  enough  arithmetic  for  the  ordinary  business  of 
Hfe,  and  the  commonly  used  measures;  to  smg,  and  to  kifow  cer- 
tain songs  by  rotej  to  know  about  the  real  things  of  life;  the  Cate- 
chism and  the  Bible;  a  general  knowledge  of  history,  and  espe- 
cially the  creation,  fall,  and  redemption  of  man;  the  elements  of 
geography  and  astronomy;  and  a  knowledge  of  the  trades  and 
occupations  of  life;  aU  of  which,  says  Comenius,  can  be  taught 
better  through  the  mother  tongue  than  through  the  medium  of 
the  Latin  and  Greek.  In  scope  this  school  corresponds  with  the 
vernacular  school  of  modern  Europe. 

The  next  school  was  The  Latin  School,  covering  the  years  from 
twelve  to  eighteen,  and  in  this  German,  Latin,  Greek,  and  He- 
brew were  to  be  taught,  by  improved  methods,  and  with  physics 
and  mathematics  added.  This  school  he  divided  into  six  classes, 
named  from  the  principal  study  in  each,  as  follows:  (i)  Grammar, 
(2)  Physics,  (3)  Mathematics,  (4)  Ethics,  (5)  Dialectics,  (6)  Rhet- 
oric. He  also  later  outHned  a  plan  for  a  six-class  Gymnasium  for 
Saros-Patak  (R.  220),  culminating  in  a  seventh  year  for  prepara- 
tion for  the  ministry,  which  was  an  improvement  on  the  Latin 
School  and  very  modem  in  character.  itaE  such  a  school  be- 
come cojnmon,  secondary  education  in  Europe  might  have  been  a 
century  in  advance  of  where  the  nineteeiith  century  found  it. 
The  Latin  school  was  to  be  attended  only  by  those  of  ability 
who  were  likely  to  enter  the  service  of  Church  or  State,  or  who 
intended  to  pass  on  to  the  University.  This  last  was  to  cover 
the  period  from  eighteen  to  twenty^four.  Unlike  all  educational 
practice  of  his  time  and  later,  Comenius  here  provides  for  an 
educational  ladder  of  the  present-day  American  type,  wholly 


EyJumf  M:  S : 


fffhucf/e 


I^e^  here  an   Cs,ilc  .  wlw  tojcruc    ni^    Ooc) . 


<^<t 


Plate  3.   John  Amos  Comenius  (i 592-1670) 

The  Moravian  Bishop  at  the  age  of  fifty.     (After  an  engraving  by  Glover, 
printed  as  a  frontispiece  to  Hartlib's  A  Reformation  of  Schooles.  London,  1642.) 


Scientific  method  and  the  schools   223 

unlike  the  European  two-class  school  system  which  (p.  187)  later 
evolved.  .       '  /^  v- 

Comenius'  work  in  reforming  language  teaching.  At  the  time 
Comenius  lived  and  wrote,  the  languages  constituted  almost  the 
only  subject  of  study,  and  Latin  grammar  was  the  great  intro- 
ductory subject.  Comenius  early  became  convinced,  as  a  result 
of  his  teaching  and  studies  in  educational  method,  that  the  ancient 
classical  authors  were  not  only  too  difficult  for  boys  beginning  the 
study  of  Latin,  but  that  they  also  did  not  contain  the  type  of  real 
knowledge  he  felt  should  be  taught  in  the  schools.  He  accord- 
ingly set  to  work  to  construct  a  series  of  introductory  Latin  read- 
ers which  would  form  a  graded  introduction  to  the  study  of  Latin, 
and  which  would  also  introduce  the  pupil  to  the  type  of  world 
knowledge  and  scientific  information  he  felt  should  be  taught. 

Beginning  his  textbook  work  with  the  Janua,  and  after- 
wards in  the  Vestihulum  and  Orhis  Pictus  as  well,  Comenius  not 
only  simplified  the  teaching  of  Latin  by  producing  the  best  text- 
books for  instruction  in  the  subject  the  world  had  ever  known, 
but  he  also  shifted  the  whole  emphasis  in  instruction  from  words 
toothings,  and  made  the  teaching  of  scientific  knowledge  and  use- 
ful world  information  the  keynote  of  his  work.  The  hundred 
different  chapters  of  the  Janua,  and  the  hundred  and  fifty-one 
chapters  of  the  Orhis  Pictus,  were  devoted  to  imparting  informa- 
tion as  to  all  kinds  of  useful  subjects.  (See  R.  221  for  four 
pages  of  illustrations  from  the  Orbis  Pictus.) 

The  success  of  these  textbooks  was  immediate  and  very  great. 
Within  a  short  time  after  the  pubHcation  of  the  Janua  it  had  been 
translated  into  Flemish,  Bohemian,  English,  French,  German, 
Greek,  Hungarian,  Italian,  Latin,  Polish,  Spanish,  and  Swedish, 
as  well  as  into  Arabic,  Mongohan,  Russian,  and  Turkish.  The 
Orhis  Pictus  was  an  even  greater  success.  It  went  through  many 
editions,  in  many  languages;  stood  without  a  cornpetitor  in 
.  Europe  for  a  hundred  and  fifteen  years;  and  was  used  as  an  intro- 
ductory textbook  for  nearly  two  hundred  years.  An  Ameri- 
can edition  was  brought  out  in  New  York  City,  as  late  as  1810. 
Thousands  of  parents,  who  knew  nothing  of  Comenius  and  cared 
nothing  for  his  educational  ideas,  bought  the  book  for  their  chil- 
dren because  they  found  that  they  liked  the  pictures  and  learned 
the  language  easily  from  it. 

Place  and  influence  of  Comenius.  Comenius  stands  in  the 
history  of  education^n  a  position  of  commanding  importance. 


/ 


224       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

He  introduces  the  whole  modern  conception  of  the  educational 
process,  and  outlines  many  of  the  modern  movements  for  the  im- 
provement of  educational  procedure.  What  Petrarch  was  to  the 
revival  of  learning,  what  WycHffe  was  to  religious  thought,  what 
Copernicus  was  to  modern  science,  and  what  Bacon  and  Des- 
cartes were  to  modern  philosophy,  Comenius  was  to  educational 
practice  and  thinking  (R.  222),  The  germ  of  almost  all  eight- 
eenth- and  nineteenth-century  educational  theory  is  to  be  found 
in  his  work,  and  he,  more  than  any  one  before  him  and  for  at  least 
two  centuries  after  him,  made  an  earnest  effort  to  introduce  the 
new  science  studies  into  the  school.  Far  more  liberal  than  his 
Lutheran  or  Calvinistic  or  Anglican  or  Catholic  contemporaries, 
he  planned  his  school  for  the  education  of  youth  in  religion  and 
Jearning  and  to  fit  them  for  the  needs  of  a  modern  world.  Unlike 
the  textbooks  of  his  time,  and  for  more  than  a  century  afterward, 
his  were  free  from  either  sectarian  bigotry  or  the  intense  and 
gloomy  atmosphere  of  the  age. 

Yet  Comenius  lived  at  an  unfortunate  period  in  the  history  of 
human  progress.  The  early  part  of  the  seventeenth  century  was 
not  a  time  when  an  enthusiastic  and  aggressive  and  liberal- 
minded  reformer  could  expect  much  of  a  hearing  anywhere  in 
western  Europe.  The  shockjpf  the  contest  into  which  western 
Christendom  had  been  plunged  by  the  challenge  of  Luther  had 
been  felt  in  every  corner  of  Europe,  and  the  culmination  of  a  cen- 
tury of  warfare  was  then  raging,  with  all  the  bitterness  and  brutal- 
ity that  a  religious  motive  develops.  Christian  Europe  was  too 
filled  with  an  atmosphere  of  suspicion  and  distrust  and  hatred  to 
be  in  any  mood  to  consider  reforms  for  the  improvement  of  the 
education  of  mankind.  As  a  result  the  far-reaching  changes  in 
method  formulated  by  Comenius  made  but  sUght  impression  on 
his  contemporaries;  his  attempt  to  introduce  scientific  studies 
awakened  suspicion,  rather  than  interest;  and  the  new  method 
which  he  formulated  in  his  Great  Didactic  was  ignored  and  the 
book  itself  was  forgotten  for  ^ceiitiiries.  His  great  influence 
on  educational  progress  was  through  the  reform  his  textbooks 
worked  in  the  teaching  of  Latin,  and  the  slow  infiltration  into  the 
schools  of  the  scientific  ideas  they  contained.  As  a  result,  many 
of  the  fundamentally  sound  reforms  for  which  he  stood  had  to  be 
worked  out  anew  in  the  nineteenth  centurv. 


SCIENTIFIC  METHOD  AND  THE  SCHOOLS    225 

IV.  REALISM  AND  THE  SCHOOLS 
The  vernacular  schools.  The  ideas  4or  which  the  realists  Just 
described  had  stood  were  adopted  in  the  people's  schools  but 
slowly,  and  came  only  after  long  waiting.  The  final  incorpora- 
tion of  science  instruction  into  elementary  education  did  not  come 
until  the  nineteenth  century,  and  then  was  an  outgrowth  of  the 
reform  work  of  Pestalozzi  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  new  social, 
political,  economic,  and  industrial  forces  of  a  modem  world  on  the 
other. 

The  Peace  of  Westphalia  (1648),  which  closed  a  century  of  bit- 
ter and  vindictive  reUgious  warfare,  was  followed  by  another  cen- 
tury of  hatred,  suspicion,  and  narrow  religious  intolerance  and 
reaction.  All  parties  now  adopted  an  extremely  conservative  at- 
titude in  matters  of  religion  and  education,  and  the  protection  of 
orthodoxy  became  the  chief  purpose  of  the  school.  Reading,  re^^ 
ligion,  a  little  counting  and  writing,  and,  in  Teutonic  lands,  music^ 
came  to  constitute  the  curriculum  of  such  elementary  vernacular 
schools  as  had  come  to  exist,  and  the  religious  Primer  and  the 
^ihle  became  the  great  school  textbooks.  The  people  were  poor, 
niuch  of  Europe  was  impoverished  and  depopulated  as  a  result  of 
long-continued  religious  strife,  the  common  people  still  occupied  a 
very  low  social  position,  there  were  as  yet  no  qualified  teachers, 
and  no  need  for  general  education  aside  from  reUgion.  Still  more, 
during  more  than  a  thousand  years  the  Church  had  established 
the  tradition  of  providing  free  education,  and  when  the  governing 
authorities  of  the  States  which  turned  to  Protestantism  had  taken 
from  the  Church  both  the  opportunity  to  continue  the  schools 
and  the  wealth  with  which  to  maintain  them,  they  were  seldom 
willing  to  tax  themselves  to  set  up  institutions  to  continue  the 
work  formerly  done  gratis  by  the  Church.  In  consequence,  re- 
gardless of  Protestant  educational  theory  as  to  the  need  for  gen- 
eral education,  but  Httle  progress  in  providing  vernacular  schools 
was  made  during  the  whole  of  the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth 
centuries. 

The  transition  now  practically  complete.  From  the  time  Pe- 
trarch made  his  first  "find"  at  Liege  (1333),  in  the  form  of  two 
previously  unknown  orations  of  Cicero  (p.  132),  to  the  publica- 
tion of  the  Prificipia  (p.  208)  of  Newton  (1687),  is  a  period  of  ap- 
proximately three  and  a  half  centuries.  During  these  three  and  a 
half  centuries  a  complete  transformation  of  world-life  had  been 


226        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

effected,  and  the  m^aeyal  man,  with  his  eyes  on  the  past,  had 
given  place  to  the  modern  man  with  his  eyes  on  the  future.  Dur- 
ing these  three  and  a  half  centuries  revolutionary  forces  had  been 
at  work  in  the  world  of  ideas,  and  the  transition  from  mediaeval 
to  modern  attitudes  had  been  accomplished.  From  1333  to  1433 
was  the  century  of  "literary  finds,"  and  during  this  period  the 
monastic  treasures  were  brought  to  light  and  edited  and  the 
classical  literature  of  Rome  restored.  Greek  also  was  restored  to 
the  western  world,  and  a  reformed  Latin,  Greek,  and  Hebrew 
were  given  the  place  of  first  importance  in  the  new  humanistic, 
school.  The  invention  of  printing  took  place  in  1423;  1456  wit- 
nessed the  appearance  of  the  first  printed  book,  and  the  perfection 
of  the  new  means  for  the  multiplication  of  books  and  the  dissemi- 
nation of  ideas.  Before  1500  the  great  era  of  geographical  dis- 
covery had  been  inaugurated;  a  sea-route  to  India  was  found  in 
1487;  and  a  new  continent  in  1492.  In  1515-18  Magellan's  ships 
rounded  the  world. 

In  1 51 7  Luther  issued  the  challenge,  the  shock  of  which  was 
felt  in  every  comer  of  Christian  Europe,  and  within  a  half -century 
much  of  northern  and  western  Europe  had  been  lost  to  the  origi- 
nal Roman  Church.  Soon  independence  in  thinking  had  been  . 
extended  to  the  problem  of  the  organization  of  the  universe,  and 
in  1543  Copernicus  issued  the  book  that  clearly  marks  the  begin- 
ning of  modern  scientific  thinking  and  inquiry.  Bacon  had  done 
his  organizing  work  by  i62o^and  Newton's  Principia  (1687)  fi- 
nally established  modern  scientific  thought  and  work.  Comenius 
died  in  \j 671,.  his  great  organizing  work  done,  and  his  textbooks, 
with  their  many  new  educational  ideas,  in  use  all  over  Europe. 
The  mediaeval  attitude  still  continued  in  religion  and  govern- 
ment, but  the  world  as  a  whole  had  left  mediaeval  attitudes  be- 
hind it,  and  was  facing  the  future  of  modern  world  organization 
and  life.  To  the  educational  organization  of  this  modern  world 
we  now  turn,  though  before  doing  so  we  shall  try  to  present  dT 
cross- section,  as  it  were,  of  the  development  in  educational  theofy 
and  practice  which  had  been  attained  by  about  the  middle  of  the 
eighteenth  century.  ., 

QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

1.  Explain  why  the  scholars  of  the  time  were  so  intent  on  producing  a  new 
race  of  Roman  youths  for  a  revived  Latin  scholarly  world. 

2.  Show  that  a  reaction  against  humanism  was  certain  to  arise,  and  why. 

3.  How  do  you  explain  the  very  small  influence  exerted  on  the  Latin  gram- 


SCIENTIFIC  METHOD  AND  THE  SCHOOLS    22-] 

mar  schools  of  England  by  the  non-conformist  Academies,  after  they  had 
been  absorbed  into  the  existing  English  non-state  system  of  higher 
schools? 

4.  Compare  Milton  and  Montaigne. 

5.  What  would  be  the  most  probable  effect  on  education  of  the  erection  of 
the  polished-man-of-the-world  ideal? 

6.  Enumerate  the  forces  favoring  and  opposing  the  change  of  the  language 
of  instruction  from  Latin  to  the  vernacular.  * 

7.  How  many  of  the  thirteen  principles  of  the  Innovators  do  we  still  hold 
to  be  valid? 

8.  Just  what  was  new  in  the  nine  fundamental  rules  laid  down  by  Ratke, 
in  his  Methodus  Nova  ? 

9.  What  is  your  estimate  of  the  vernacular  schools  as  outlined  by  Comenius? 
Of  the  plans  for  a  gymnasium  at  Saros-Patak? 

10.  Compare  Comenius'  Latin  school  with  the  College  of  Calvin  (p.  175). 

11.  State  the  new  ideas  in  instruction  embodied  in  the  textbooks  of 
Comenius. 

12.  Show  that  Comenius  dominates  modern  educational  ideas,  even  though 
his  work  was  largely  lost,  in  the  same  way  that  Petrarch  or  Wy cliff e  or 
Copernicus  do  modern  work  in  their  fields. 

13.  Explain  the  very  slow  development  of  vernacular  schools  after  the 
Protestant  Revolts. 

14.  Why  would  the  introduction  of  real  studies  into  them  be  especially  slow? 

SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  illustrative  selections 
are  reproduced:  Li     ^   j    < 

210.  Rabelais:  On  the  Nature  of  Education.  y^.^-C-'^i^''^-" 

211.  Milton:  The  Aim  and  Purpose  of  Education.  ^*Z'^     f  *r^  L 

212.  Milton:  His  Program  for  Study.  /L/'oQ,''K^^ 

213.  Adamson:  Discontent  of  the  Nobility  with  the  Schools;j    ^    /'x.^^'-*^ 

214.  Montaigne:  Ridicule  of  the  Humanistic  Pedants.        /P^^^^^'^f  <Z 


215.  Montaigne:  His  Conception  of  Education.  (/    -)\^—  /^      ^ 

216.  Locke:  Extracts  from  his  Thoughts  on  Education.      ^v        /, 


217.  Locke:  Plan  for  Working  Schools  for  Poor  Children.    V^^  ^^'^'^'^^'^''ZjA 

218.  Comenius:  Title-Page  of  the  Great  Didactic.  ^/  / (^  / 

219.  Comenius:  Contents  of  the  Grea/ Z>f£?odJc.  /^    7  A'" 

220.  Comenius:  Plan  for  the  Gymnasium  at  Saros-Patak. 

221.  Comenius:  Sample  pages  from  the  Orhis  Pictus. 

(a)  A  page  from  a  Latin-German  edition  of  1740- 

(b)  Two  pages  from  a  Latin-English  edition  of  1727. 

(c)  A  page  from  the  New  York  edition  of  1810. 

222.  Butler:  Place  of  Comenius  in  the  History  of  Education. 

223.  Gesner:  Need  for  Realschulen  for  the  New  Classes  to  be  Educated. 

224.  Handbill:  How  the  Scientific  Studies  began  at  Cambridge. 

225.  Green:  Cambridge  Scheme  of  Study  of  1707. 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

*Adamson,  J.  W.     Pioneers  of  Modern  Education,  1 600-1700. 

Barnard,  Henry.     German  Teachers  and  Educators. 

Browning,  Oscar,  Editor.     Milton's  Tractate  on  Education. 
*Butler,  N.  M.     "The  Place  of  Comenius  in  the  History  of  Education": 
in  Proc.  N.E.  A.,  1892,  pp.  723-28. 


228        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

*Comenius,  J.  A.    Orbis  Pictus  (Bardeen;  Syracuse). 
Hanus,  Paul  H.    "The  Permanent  Influence  of  Comenius";  in  Edvica- 

tional  Review,  vol.  3,  pp.  226-36  (March,  1892). 
Laurie,  S.  S.     History  of  Educational  Opinion  since  the  Renaissance. 
*Laurie,  S.  S.     John  Amos  Comenius. 
Quick,  R.  H.,  Editor.     Lockers  Thoughts  on  Education. 
*Quick,  R.  H.     Essays  on  Educational  Reformers. 

*Vostrovsky,  Clafti.     "A  European  School  of  the  Time  of  Comenius 
(Prague,  1609)";  in  Education,  vol.  17,  pp.  356-60  (February,  1897.) 
Wordsworth,  Christopher.     Scholce  Academicoe;  Studies  at  the  English 
Universities  in  the  Eighteenth  Century. 


i^^uA^ 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

THEORY  AND  PRACTICE    BY  THE  MIDDLE  OF  THE 
EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY 

We  have  now  reached,  in  our  history  of  the  transition  age  which 
began  with  the  Revival  of  Learning  —  the  great  events  of  which 
were  the  recovery  of  the  ancient  learning,  the  rediscovery  of  the 
historic  past,  the  reawakening  of  scholarship,  and  the  rise  of  re- 
ligious and  scientific  inquiry  —  the  end  of  the  transition  period, 
and  we  are  now  ready  to  pass  to  a  study  of  the  development  and 
progress  of  education  in  modem  times.  Before  doing  so,  however, 
we  desire  to  gather  up  and  state  the  progress  in  both  educational 
theory  and  practice  which  had  been  attained  by  the  end  of  this 
transition  period,  and  to  present,  as  it  were,  a  cross-section  of 
education  at  about  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century.  To  do 
this,  then,  before  passing  to  a  consideration  of  educational  develop- 
ment in  modern  times,  will  be  the  purpose  of  this  chapter.  We 
shall  first  review  the  progress  made  in  evolving  a  theory  as  to  the 
educational  purpose,  and  then  present  a  cross-section  view  of  the 
schools  of  the  time  under  consideration. 

I.  PRE-EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY  EDUCATIONAL  THEORIES 

The  rise  of  the  vernacular  religious  school.  For  the  first  time 
in  history,  if  we  except  the  schools  of  the  early  Christian  period, 
the  Protestant  Revolts  created  a  demand  for  some  form  of  an  ele- 
mentary religious  school  for  all.  The  Protestant  theory  as  to  per- 
sonal versus  collective  salvation  involved  as  a  consequence  the 
idea  of  the  education  of  all  in  the  essentials  of  the  Christian  faith 
and  doctrine.  The  aim  was  the  same  as  before  —  personal  salva- 
tion —  but  the  method  was  now  changed  from  that  of  the  Church 
as  intermediary  to  personal  knowledge  and  faith  and  effort.  To 
be  saved,  one  must  know  something  of  the  Word  of  God,  and  this 
necessitated  instruction.  To  this  end,  in  theory  at  least,  schools 
had  to  be  established  to  educate  the  young  for  membership  in  the 
new  type  of  Church  relationship.  Reading  the  vernacular,  a  little 
counting  and  writing,  in  Teutonic  countries  a  httle  music,  and 
careful  instruction  in  a  religious  Primer  (R.  202),  the  Catechism, 
and  the  Bible,  now  came  to  constitute  the  subject-matter  of  a  new 


230       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

vernacular  school  for  the  children  of  Protestants,  and  to  a  certain 
extent  in  time  for  the  children  of  Catholics  as  well.  As  we 
pointed  out  earlier  (p.  187),  between  this  new  type  of  school  for 
religious  ends  and  the  older  Latin  grammar  school  for  scholarly 
purposes  there  was  almost  no  relationship,  and  the  two  developed 
wholly  independently  of  one  another.  In  the  Latin  grammar 
schools  one  studied  to  become  a  scholar  and  a  leader  in  the  politi- 
cal or  ecclesiastical  world;  in  the  vernacular  religious  school  one 
learned  to  read  that  he  might  be  able  to  read  the  Catechism  and 
the  Bible,  and  to  know  the  will  of  the  Heavenly  Father.  There 
was  scarcely  any  other  purpose  to  the  maintenance  of  the  ele- 
mentary vernacular  schools.  This  condition  continued  until  well 
into  the  eighteenth  century. 

Early  unsuccessful  educational  reformers.  Back  in  the  seven- 
teenth century,  as  we  have  pointed  out  in  the  preceding  chapter, 
a  very  earnest  effort  was  made  by  Ratke  and  Comenius  to  intro- 
duce a  larger  conception  of  the  educational  process  into  the  ele- 
mentary vernacular  school,  to  eliminate  the  gloomy  religious  ma- 
terial from  the  textbooks,  to  substitute  a  human-welfare  purpose 
for  the  exclusively  life-beyond  view,  and  to  transform  the  school 
into  an  institution  for  imparting  both  learning  and  religion.  Co- 
menius in  particular  hoped  to  make  of  the  new  elementary  reli- 
gious school  a  potent  instrument  for  human  progress  by  introduc- 
ing new  subject-matter,  and  by  formulating  laws  and  developing 
methods  for  its  work  which  would  be  in  harmony  with  the  new 
scientific  procedure  so  well  stated  by  Francis  Bacon. 

John  Locke,  and  the  disciplinary  theory  of  education.  An- 
other commanding  figure  in  seventeenth-century  pedagogical 
thought  was  the  EngHsh  scholar,  philosopher,  teacher,  physician, 
and  pohtical  writer,  John  Locke  (163  2-1 704).  In  the  preceding 
chapter  we  pointed  out  the  place  of  Locke  as  a  writer  on  the  edu- 
cation of  the  sons  of  the  English  gentry,  and  illustrated  by  an  ex- 
tract from  his  Thoughts  (R.  216)  the  importance  he  placed  on  such 
a  practical  type  of  education  as  would  prepare  a  gentleman's  son 
for  the  social  and  political  demands  of  a  world  fast  becoming 
modern.  Locke's  place  in  the  history  of  education,  though,  is  of 
much  more  importance  than  was  there  (p.  217)  indicated.  Locke 
was  essentially  the  founder  of  modern  psychology,  based  on  the 
application  of  the  methods  of  modern  scientific  investigation  to  a 
study  of  the  mind,  and  he  is  also  of  importance  in  the  history 
of  educational  thought  as  having  set  forth,  at  some  length  and 


THEORY  AND  PRACTICE  BY  1750         231 

with  much  detail,  the  disciplinary  conception  of  the  educational 
process. 

In  his  Thoughts  Locke  first  sets  forth  at  length  the  necessity  for 
discipliningTHe  body  by  means  of  diet,  exercise,  and  the  harden- 
ing process.  "A  sound  mind  in  a  sound  body  "  he  conceives  to  be 
"  a  short  but  full  description  of  a  happy  state  in  this  world,"  and  a 
fundamental  basis  for  morality  and  learning.  The  formation  of 
good^abits  and  manners  through  proper  training,  and  the  proper 
adjustment  of  punishments  and  rewards  next  occupies  his  atten- 
tion, and  he  then  explains  his  theory  as  to  making  all  punishments 
the  natural  consequences  of  acts.  Similarly  the  mind,  as  the 
body,  must  be  disciplined  to  virtue  by  training  the  child  to  deny, 
subordinate  desires,  and  apply  reason  to  acts.  The  formation  of 
good  habits  and  the  disciplining  of  the  desires  Locke  regards  as 
the  foundations  of  virtue. 

Sirrnlarly,  in  intellectual  education,  good  thinking  and  the  em- 
ployment of  reason  is  the  aim,  and  these,  too,  must  be  attained 
through  the  proper  discipline  of  the  mind.  Good  intellectual  edu- 
cation does  not  consist  merely  in  studying  and  learning,  he  con- 
tends, as  was  the  common  practice  in  the  grammar  schools  of  his 
time,  but  must  be  achieved  by  a  proper  drilling  of  the  powers  of 
the  mind  through  the  use  of  selected  studies.  The  purpose  of 
education,  he  holds,  is  above  all  else  to  make  man  a  reasoning 
creature.  In  the  education  given  in  the  grammar  schools  of  his 
time  he  found  much  that  seemed  to  him  wasteful  of  time  and 
thoroughly  bad  in  principle,  and  he  used  much  space  to  point 
out  defects  and  describe  better  methods  of  teaching  and  manage- 
ment, giving  in  some  detail  reasons  therefor.  His  ideas  as  to 
needed  reforms  in  the  teaching  of  Latin  (R.  227)  are  illustrative. 

Locke  on  elementary  education.  For  the  beginnings  of  educa- 
tion, and  for  elementary  education  in  general,  Locke  sticks  close 
to  the  prevailing  religious  conception  of  his  time.  As  for  the  edu- 
cation of  the  common  people,  he  writes: 

The  knowledge  of  the  Bible  and  the  business  of  his  own  calUng  is 
enough  for  the  ordinary  man;  a  Gentleman  ought  to  go  further. 

Locke  does,  however,  give  some  very  sensible  suggestions  as  to  the 
reading  of  the  Bible  (R.  228),  the  imparting  of  religious  ideas  to 
children,  and  the  desirability  of  transforming  instruction  so  as  to 
make  it  pleasant  and  agreeable,  with  plenty  of  natural  playful 
actisdty. 


232       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

Locke's  great  influence  on  educational  thought  did  not  come, 
though,  for  nearly  three  quarters  of  a  century  afterward,  and  it 
came  then  through  the  popularization  of  his  best  ideas  by  Rous- 
seau. 

Restating  and  expanding  the  leading  ideas  of  Locke  in  his 
Emile  (chapter  xxi),  and  putting  them  into  far  more  attractive 
Hterary  form,  Rousseau  scattered  Locke's  ideas  as  to  educational 
reform  over  Europe.  In  particular  Rousseau  popularized  Locke's 
ideas  as  \o  the  replacement  of  authority  by  reason  and  investiga- 
tion), his  Emphasis  on  physical  activity  and  health,  his  contention 
thai  the  education  of  children  should  be  along  Hues  that  were 
natural  and  normal  for  children,  and  above  all  Locke's  plea  for 
education  through  the  senses  rather  than  the  niemory.  In  so 
popularizing  Locke's  ideas,  and  at  a  time  when  all  the  political 
tendencies  of  the  period  were  in  the  direction  of  the  rejection  of 
authority  and  the  emphasis  of  the  individual,  those  educational 
reformers  who  were  inspired  by  the  writings  of  Rousseau  created 
and  apphed,  largely  on  the  foundations  laid  down  by  John  Locke, 
a  new  theory  as  to  educational  aims  and  procedure  which  domi- 
nated all  early  nineteenth-century  instruction.  This  we  shall  trace 
further  in  a  subsequent  chapter  (chapter  xxi). 

II.  MID-EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY  EDUCATIONAL  CONDITIONS 

It  was  at  this  point  that  the  educational  problem  stood,  in  so 
far  as  a  theory  as  to  educational  aims  and  the  educational  process 
was  concerned,  when  Rousseau  took  it  up  (1762).  Before  passing 
to  a  consideration  of  his  work,  though,  and  the  work  of  those  in- 
spired by  him  and  by  the  French  revolutionary  writers  and  states- 
men, let  us  close  this  thirdj)art  of  our  history  by  a  brief  survey  of 
the  developrnent  so  far  attained,  the  purpose,  character,  aims, 
and  nature  of  instruction  in  the  schools,  and  their  mean§^  of  sup- 
port and  control  at  about  the  middle  of  the  century  in  which 
Rousseau  wrote,  and  before  the  philosophical  and  political  revolu- 
tions of  the  latter  half  of  the  eighteenth  century  had  begun  to  in- 
fluence educational  aims  and  procedure  and  control. 

The  purpose.  The  purpose  of  maintaining  the  elementary 
vernacular  school,  in  all  European  lands,  remained  at  the  middle 
of  the  eighteenth  century  much  as  it  was  a  century  before,  though 
in  the  German  States  and  in  the  American  Colonies  there  was  a 
noticeable  shifting  of  emphasis  from  the  older  exclusively  religious 
purpose  toward  a  newer  conception  of  education  as  preparation 


THEORY  AND  PRACTICE  BY  1750         233 

for  life  in  the  world  here.  Still,  one  learned  to  read  chiefly  "to 
learn  some  orthodox  Catechism,"  "to  read  fluently  in  the  New 
Testament,"  and  to  know  the  will  of  God,  or,  as  stated  in  the  laiw 
of  t"Ke  Connecticut  Colony  (R.  193),  ''in  some  competent  measure 
to  understand  the  main  grounds  and  principles  of  Christian  re- 
ligion necessary  to  salvation."  The  teacher  was  still  carefully 
looked  after  as  to  his  ''soundness  in  the  faith"  (R.  238  a);  he  was 
required  "to  catechise  his  scholars  in  the  principles  of  the  Chris- 
tian religion,"  and  "to  commend  his  labors  amongst  them  unto 
God  by  prayer  morning  and  evening,  taking  care  that  his  scholars 
do  reverently  attend  during  the  same."  The  minister  in  practi- 
cally all  lands  examined  the  children  as  to  their  knowledge  of  the 
Catechism  and  the  Bible,  and  on  his  visits  quizzed  them  as  to  the 
Sunday  sermon. 

In  Church-of-England  schools  "  the  End  and  Chief  Design ' '  of  the 
schools  established  continued  to  be  instruction  in  "  the  Knowledge 
and  Practice  of  the  Christian  Religion  as  Professed  and  Taught  in 
the  Church  of  England"  (R.  238  b).  In  German  lands  the  ele- 
mentary vernacular  school  was  still  regarded  as  "the  portico  of 
the  Temple,"  "  Christianity  its  principal  work,"  and  not  as  "mere 
establishments  preparatory  to  pubHc  life,  but  be  pervaded  by  the 
rehgious  spirit."  In  the  schools  of  La  Salle's  organization, 
which  was  most  prominent  in  elementary  vernacular  education 
in  Catholic  France,  the  aim  continued  to  be  (R.  182)  "to  teach 
them  to  Hve  honestly  and  uprightly,  by  instructing  them  in  the 
principles  of  our  holy  religion  and  by  teaching  them  Christian 
precepts." 

Weakening  of  the  old  religious  theory.  By  the  middle  of  the 
eighteenth  century,  however,  there  is  a  noticeable  weakening  of 
the  hold  of  the  old  religious  theory  on  the  schools  in  most  Protes- 
tant lands.  In  England  there  was  a  marked  relaxation  of  the 
old  religious  intolerance  in  educational  matters  as  the  century 
proceeded,  and  new  textbooks,  embodying  but  little  of  the  old 
gloomy  religious  material,  appeared  and  began  to  be  used.  Co- 
incident with  this  growth  of  rehgious  tolerance  among  the 
EngHsh  we  find  the  Church  of  England  redoubh'ng  its  efforts 
to '  hold  the  children  of  its  adherents,  by  the  organization  of 
parish  schools  and  the  creation  of  avast  system  of  charitable 
religious  schools.  In  German  lands,  too,  a  marked  shifting  of 
emphasis  away  from  solely  religious  ends  and  toward  the  needs 
of  the  government  began,  toward  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury, to  be  evident. 


234        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


llUiHlllilljllMill)|l/llililil|IIM.I.i 


m 


raDCDels 


It  was  in  the  American  Colonies,  though,  that  the  waning  of  the- 
old  religious  interest  was  most  notable.  Due  to  rude  frontier 
conditions,  the  decline  in  force  of  the  old  religious-town  govern- 
ments, the  diversity  of  sects,  the  rise  of  new  trade  and  civil  in- 
terests, and  the  breakdown  of  old-home  connections,  the  hold  on 
the  people  of  the  old  religious  doctrines  was  weakened  there  ear- 
lier than  in  the  old  world.  By  1750  the  change  in  religious  think- 
ing in  America  had  become  quite  marked. 

Studies  and  textbooks.  The  studies  of  the  elementary  vernac- 
ular school  remained,  throughout  the  whole  of  the  eighteenth 
century,  much  as  before,  namely,  reading, 
a  little  writing  and  ciphering,  some  spell- 
ing, religion,  and  in  Teutonic  countries  a 
little  music.  La  Salle  (R.  182)  had  pre- 
scribed, for  the  Catholic  vernacular  schools 
of  France,  instruction  in  French,  some 
Latin,  "orthography,  arithmetic,  the 
matins  and  vespers,  le  Pater,  TAve  Maria, 
le  Credo  et  le  Confiteor,  the  Command- 
ments, responses.  Catechism,  duties  of  a 
Christian,  and  maxims  and  precepts  drawn 
from  the  Testament."  The  Catechism 
was  to  be  taught  one  half-hour  daily.  The 
schoolbooks  in  England  in  Locke's  day,  as 
he  tells  us  in  his  Thoughts,  were  "  the  Horn 
Book,  Primer,  Psalter,  Testament,  and 
Bible."  These  indicate  merely  a  religious 
vernacular  school.  The  purpose  stated 
for  the  English  Church  charity-schools 
(R.  238  b),  schools  that  attained  to  large 
importance  in  England  and  the  Ameri- 
can Colonies  during  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury, shows  them  to  have  been,  similarly,  rehgious  vernacular 
schools.  The  School^  Regulations  which  Frederick  the  Great 
promulgated  for  Prussia  (1763),  fixed  the  textbooks  to  be  used 
(R.  274,  §  20),  and  indicate  that  the  instruction  in  Prussia  was 
still  restricted  to  reading,  writing,  religion,  singing,  and  a  little 
arithmetic.  In  colonial  America,  Noah  Webster's  description 
(R.  230)  of  the  schools  he  attended  in  Connecticut,  about  1764-70, 
shows  that  the  studies  and  textbooks  were  "chiefly  or  wholly 
Dilworth's  Spelhng  Books,  the  Psalter,  Testament,  and  Bible," 


Umnopqt^f 

IntoeOamtofGODt^e^ 
tt)r  folic  <S^^oa:2ltneiu 

'^©r^atbtt.tDSicb  art  m|>f «. 
■^otnveatotxxB  be  «pp  *«<«« 
Slip  Innaoom  tamn'ttip  mil  bt 
lonelu  Caril).a«ii  is  mi^tactm 
Mnt  tu  (bis  IMP  OUT  Dailp  tucan 
(no  t«;attu  ti8  our  trt(|)aflts,a»v 
Bit  rQ»ntt  ttKtn  H)at  trili^alSir 
Ki«|ii(l«<>Sni>  Icabtus  not  mid 
ttmvtawen  ^2»ut  DdtOtr  bs  f com 
iwll  if^i  «&'"« "  •''<  J^inBOo™'. 
potiwT.aQD  al»tt(.fw  tbtr  anto. 


Fig.  49.  A  Horn  Book 


THEORY  AND  PRACTICE  BY  1750         235 

with  a  little  writing  and  ciphering.    A  few  words  of  description 
of  these  older  books  may  prove  useful  here. 

The  Horn  Book.  The  Horn  Book  goes  back  to  the  close  of 
the  fifteenth  century,  and  by  the  end  of  the  sixteenth  century 
was  in  common  use  throughout  England.  Somewhat  similar 
alphabet  boards,  lacking  the  handle,  were  also  used  in  Holland, 
France,  and  in  German  lands.  This,  a  thin  oak  board  on  which 
was  pasted  a  printed  slip,  covered  by  translucent  horn,  was  the 
book  from  which  children  learned  their  letters  and  began  to  read, 
the  mastery  of  which  usually  required  some  time.  The  Horn 
Book  was  much  used  well  into  the  eighteenth  century,  but  its 
reading  matter  was  in  time  incorporated  into  the  school  Primer, 
now  evolved  out  of  an  earlier  elementary  religious  manual. 

The  Primer.  Originally  the  child  next  passed  to  the  Cate- 
chism and  the  Bible,  but  about  the  middle  of  the  seventeenth  cen- 
tury the  Primer  began  to  be  used.  The  Primer  in  its  original 
form  was  a  simple  manual  of  devotion  for  the  laity,  compiled 
without  any  thought  of  its  use  in  the  schools.  It  contained  the 
Creed,  the  Lord's  Prayer,  the  T^n  Commandments,  and  a  few  of 
the  more  commonly  used  prayers  and  psalms.  The  Catechism 
soon  was  added,  and  with  the  prefixing  of  the  alphabet  and  a  few 
syllables  and  words  it  was  transformed,  as  schools  arose,  into  the 
first  reading  book  for  children.  There  was  at  first  no  attempt  at 
grading,  illustration,  or  the  introduction  of  easy  reading  material. 
About  the  close  of  the  seventeenth  century  the  illustrated  Primer, 
with  some  attempt  at  grading  and  some  additional  subject-mat- 
ter, made  its  appearance,  both  in  England  and  America,  and  at 
once  leaped  into  great  popularity. 

The  idea  possibly  goes  back  to  the  Orbis  Pictus  (1654)  of  Co- 
menius  (p.  223:  R.  221),  the  first  illustrated  schoolbook  ever 
written*  The  first  English  Primer  adapted  to  school  use  was  The 
Protestant  Tutor,  a  rather  rabid  anti-Catholic  work  which  ap- 
peared in  Londort,  about  1685.  It  was  an  abridgment  of  this 
book  which  the  same  publisher  brought  out  in  Boston,  about 
1690,  under  the  name  of  The  New  England  Primer  (R.  202). 

This  new  work  at  once  leaped  into  great  popularity,  and  be- 
came the  accepted  reading  book  in  all  the  schools  of  the  Ameri 
can  Colonies  except  those  under  the  Church,  of  England,  For 
the  next  century  and  a  quarter  it  was  the  cEief  school  and  reading 
book  in  use  among  the  Dissenters  and  Lutherans  in  America 
.Schoohnasters  drilled  the  children,  on  the  reading  matter  and  the 


236        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


Catechism  it  contained^  and  the  people  recited  from  it  yearly  in 
the  churches.  It  was  also  used  for  such  spelling  as  was  given.  It 
was  the  first  great  American  textbook  success,  and  was  still  in 
use  in  the  Boston  dame  schools  as  late  as  1806.  It  was  reprinted 
in  England,  and  enjoyed  a  great  sale  among  Dissenters  there.  Its 
sales  in  America  alone  have  been  estimated  at  least  three  million 
copies.     The  sale  in  Europe  was  also  large. 

The  Catechism.     In  all  Protestant  German  lands  the  Shorter 

Catechism  prepared  by  Luther,  or  the  later  Heidelberg  Cate- 

^^         ^    ^    «.    w  chism,  in  Calvinistic 


lands  the  Catechism  of 
Calvin .  and  in  England 
and  the  American  Col- 
onies the  Westminster 
Catechism  formed  the 
backbone  of  the  religious 
Q/X^^  AT  it  the  chief  Ena  cf  JMan  P        instruction.       Teachers 

drilled  their  pupils  m 
these  as  thoroughly  as 
on  any  other  subject, 
writing  masters  set  as. 
copies  sentences  from 
the  book,  children  were 
required  to  memorize 
the  answers,  and  the  doc- 
trines contained  were 
emphasized  by  teacher 
and  preacher  so  that  the 
children  were  saturated 
with  the  religious  ideas 
set  forth.  No  book  ex- 
cept the  Bible  did  so 
much  to  form  the  char- 
acter, and  none  so  much  to  fix  the  religious  bias  of  the  children. 
Almost  equal  importance  was  given  to  the  Catechism  in  Catholic 
lands  (R.  182,  §§  21-22),  though  there  supplemented  by  more 
religious  influences  derived  from  the  ceremonial  of  the  Church. 
Spellers.  The  next  step  forward,  in  the  transition  from  the  re- 
ligious Primer  to  secular  reading  matter  for  school  children,  came 
in  the  use  of  the  so-called  Spellers  After  about  1740  such  books 
became  very  popular,  due  to  the  publication  that  year  of  Thomas. 


THE 

SHORTER  CATECHISM, 

Agreed  upon  by  the  Reverend  AssEMBiy 
of  Divines  at  fVtftminJin, 

*R  A  T  it  th  chef  Ena  fifJMan  P 
A.  Man's  chtel  £nd  is  (o  glorirjp 
God  and  tDjoy  him  forever* 

Q.  What  RuUhcth  C«dgtvtoto  diuR  ut 
htxovie  may  gUn'fy  andenfoy  him  f 

A  The  Word  ot  God  which  is  conrained  in 
Ihe  Strip-uresof  ihe  Old  and  New/  Teftament, 
b  the  only  ru;e  fo  dire^l  us  hoYf  "we  ma> 
g'orily  end  enjoj  Him. 
Q.  iVfiat  do  the  Seripiure\  prfncipal^  Hath/ 
A,  The  Scifpiurci  principally  leach  what 
Man  Is /u  believe  concemifig God,  and  what 
Dirty  God  requires  ol  Man. 
a  ffhat  it  God  t 

A,  God  Is  a  Spirit  Inftnite,  EterntTand 

Unchaflgesbte,  In  his  Befn^,  Wifdom,  ?tVf- 

fe#  Hofincfs,  Jjftice,  Goodnefs  and  Tnuh, 

Q»  Att  thtre  more  Gnd$  than  Oat  f 

Fig.  50.  The  Westminster  CATEcmsM 

(A  page  from  The  New  England  Primer,  natural  size) 


THEORY  AND  PRACTICE  BY  1750         237 


Dilworth's  A  New  Guide  to  the  English  Tongue.  This  book  con- 
tained, as  the  title-page  (R.  229)  declared,  selected  lists  of  words 
with  rules  for  their  pronunciation,  a  short  treatise  on  grammar,  a 
collection  of  fables  with  illustrations  for  reading,  some  moral  selec- 
tions, and  forms  of  prayer  for  children.  It  became  very  popular  in 
New  as  well  as  in  old  England,  and  was  followed  by  a  long  line 
of  imitators,  culminating  in  America  in  the  publication  of  Noah 
Webster's  famous  blue-backed  American  Spelling  Book,  in  1783. 
This  was  after  the  plan  of  the  English  Dilworth,  but  was  put  in 
better  teaching  form.  It  contained  numerous  graded  lists  of 
words,  some  illustrations,  a  series  of  graded  reading  lessons,  and 
was  largely  secular  in  character.  It  at  once  superseded  the  expir- 
ing New  England  Primer  in  most  of  the  American  cities,  and  contin- 
ued popular  in  the  United  States  for  more  than  a  hundred  years. 
It  was  the  second  great  American  textbook  success,  and  was 
followed  by  a  long  list  of  popular  Spellers  and  Readers,  leading 
up  to  the  excellent  secular  Read- 
ers of  the  present  day. 

Arithmetic  and  Writing,  The 
first  English  Arithmetic,  published 
about  1540  to  1542,  has  been  en- 
tirely lost,  and  was  probably  read 
by  few.  The  first  to  attain  any 
popularity  was  Cocker's  A  rithmetic 
(1677).  this  "Being  a  Plain  and 
Familiar  Method  suitable  to  the 
meanest  Capacity,  for  the  un- 
derstanding of  that  incomparable 
Art."  A  still  more  populai  book 
was  Arithmetick:  or  that  Necessary 
Art  Made  Most  Easie,  by  J  Hod- 
der.  Writing  Master,  a  reprint  of 
which  appeared  in  Boston,  in 
1 7 19.  The  first  book  written  by 
an  American  author  was  Isaac 
Greenwood's  ArithmeHck,  Vulgar 
and  Decimal,  which  appeared  in 

Boston,  in  1729.  In  1743  appeared  Dilworth's  The  Schoolmaster'^ 
Assistant,  a  book  which  retained  its  popularity  in  both  England 
and  America  until  after  the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth  centur}'. 

No  text  in  Arithmetic  is  mentioned  in  the  School  Regulations 


Fig.  51.  Frontispiece  to  Noah 

Webster's  "American 

Spelling  Book" 

This  is  from  the  1827  edition,  reduced 
one  third  in  size. 


238        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

of  Frederick  the  Great  (R.  274,  §  20),  or  in  scarcely  any  of  the  de- 
scriptions left  us  of  eighteenth-century  schools.  The  study  itself 
was  common,  but  not  universal,  and  was  one  that  many  teachers 
were  not  competent  to  teach.  To  possess  a  reputation  as  an 
"aritJune ticker"  was  an  important  recommendation  for  a  teacher, 
while  for  a  pupil  to  be  able  to  do  sums  in  arithmetic  was  unusual, 
and  a  matter  of  much  pride  to  parents.  The  subject  was  fre- 
quently taught  by  the  writing  master,  in  a  separate  school,  while 
the  reading  teacher  confined  himself  to  reading,  spelling,  and  re- 
ligion. The  teacher  might  or  might  not  possess  an  arithmetic  of  his 
own,  but  the  instruction  to  the  pupil  was  practically  always  dic- 
tated and  copied  instruction.  Each  pupil  made  up  his  own  book 
of  rules  and  solved  problems,  and  few  pupils  ever  saw  a  printed 
arithmetic.  Many  of  the  early  arithmetics  were  prepared  after 
the  catechism  plan.  There  was  almost  no  attempt  to  use  the 
subject  for  drill  in  reasoning  or  to  give  a  concrete  type  of  instruc- 
tion, before  about  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century,  and 
but  little  along  such  reform  Unes  was  accomplished  until  after 
the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth  century. 

Writing,  similarly,  was  taught  by  dictation  and  practice,  and 
the  art  of  the  "scrivener,"  as  the  writing  master  was  called,  was 
one  thought  to  be  difficult  to  learn.  The  lack  of  practical  value 
of  the  art,  the  high  cost  of  paper,  and  the  necessity  usually  for 
special  lessons,  all  alike  tended  to  make  writing  a  much  less 
commonly  known  art  than  reading.  Fees  also  were  frequently 
charged  for  instruction  in  writing  and  arithmetic;  reading,  spell- 
ing, and  religion  being  the  only  free  subjects.  The  scrivener  and 
the  arithmetic  teacher  also  frequently  moved  about,  as  business 
warranted,  and  was  not  fixed  as  was  the  teacher  of  the  reading 
school.  AsO 

The  teachers.  The  development  of  the  vernacular  school  was 
retarded  not  only  by  the  dominance  of  the  religious  purpose  of  the 
school,  but  by  the  poor  quality  of  teachers  found  everywhere  in 
the  schools.  The  evolution  of  the  elementary-school  teacher  of 
to-day  out  of  the  church  sexton,  bell-ringer,  or  grave-digger,  or 
out  of  the  artisan,  cripple,  or  old  dame  who  added  school  teaching 
to  other  employment  in  order  to  live,  forms  one  of  the  interesting 
as  well  as  one  of  the  yet-to-be-written  chapters  in  the  history  of 
the  evolution  of  the  elementary  school. 

Teachers  in  elementary  schools  everywhere  in  the  eighteenth 
century  were  few  in  number,  poor  in  quality,  and  occupied  but 


THEORY  AND  PRACTICE  BY  1750         239 

a  lowly  position  in  the  social  scale.  School  dames  in  England 
(R.  235)  and  later  in  the  American  Colonies,  and  on  the  continent 
of  Europe  teachers  who  were  more  sextons,  choristers,  beadles, 
bell-ringers,  grave-diggers,  shoemakers,  tailors,  barbers,  pension- 
ers, and  invalids  than  teachers,  too  often  formed  the  teaching  body 
for  the  elementary  vernacular  school  (Rs.  231,  232,  233).  In 
Dutch,  German,  and  Scandinavian  lands,  and  in  colonies  founded 
by  these  people  in  America,  the  parish 
school,  closely  tied  up  with  and  de- 
pendent upon  the  parish  church,  was 
the  prevailing  type  of  vernacular 
school,  and  in  this  the  teacher  was  re- 
garded as  essentially  an  assistant  to  the 
pastor  (R.  236)  and  the  school  as  a  de- 
pendency of  the  Church. 

In  England,  in  addition  to  regular 
parish  schools  and  endowed  element- 
ary schools,  three  peculiar  institutions, 
known  as  the  Dame  School,  the  reli- 
gious charity-school,  and  the  private- 
adventure  or  "hedge  school"  had 
grown  up,  and  the  first  two_of  these 
had  reached  a  marked  development 
by  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury. Because  these  were  so  charac- 
teristic of  early  English  educational  effort,  and  also  played  such 
an  important  part  in  the  American  Colonies  as  well,  they  merit 
a  few  words  of  description  at  this  point. 

The  Dame  School.  The  Dame  School  arose  in  England  aftei 
the  Reformation.  By  means  of  it  the  increasing  desire  for  a  rudi- 
mentary knowledge  of  the  art  of  reading  could  be  satisfied,  and  at 
the  same  time  certain  women  could  earn  a  pittance.  This  type  of 
school  was  carried  early  to  the  American  Colonies,  and  out  of  it 
was  in  time  evolved,  in  New  England,  the  American  elementary 
school.  The  Dame  School  was  a  very  elementary  school,  kept  in 
a  kitchen  or  living-room  by  some  woman  who,  in  her  youth,  had 
obtained  the  rudiments  of  an  education,  and  who  now  desired  to 
earn  a  small  stipend  for  herself  by  imparting  to  the  children  of  her 
neighborhood  her  small  store  of  learning.  For  a  few  pennies  a 
week  the  dame  took  the  children  into  her  home  and  explained  to 
them  the  mysteries  connected  with  learning  the  beginnings  of 


Fig.  52.  A  "Christian 
Brothers"  School 

La  Salle  teaching  at  Grenoble. 
Note  the  adult  type  of  dress  of 
the  boys. 


240       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

reading  and  spelling.  Occasionally  a  little  writing  and  counting 
also  were  taught,  though  not  often  in  England.  In  the  American 
Colonies  the  practical  situations  of  a  new  country  forced  the  em- 
ployment as  teachers  of  women  who  could  teach  all  three  sub- 
jects, thus  early  creating  the  American  school  of  the  so-called 
"S  Rs"  —  "  Reading,  Riting,  Rithmetic."  The  Dame  School  ap- 
pears so  frequently  in  English  Hterature,  both  poetry  and  prose, 
that  it  must  have  played  a  very  important  part  in  the  beginnings 
of  elementary  education  in  England.  Of  this  school  Shenstone 
(1714-63)  writes  (R.  235): 

In  every  village  marked  with  little  spire, 
Embowered  in  trees,  and  hardly  known  to  fame, 
There  dwells,  in  lowly  shed  and  mean  attire, 
A  matron  old,  whom  we  schoolmistress  name, 
Who  boasts  unruly  brats  with  birch  to  tame. 

This  school  flourished  greatly  in  America  during  the  eighteenth 
century,  but  with  the  coming  of  Infant  Schools,  early  in  the  nine- 
teenth, was  merged  into  these  to  form  the  American  Primary 
School. 

The  religious  charity-school.  Another  thoroughly  characteris- 
tic English  institution  was  the  church  charity-school.  The  first 
of  these  was  founded  in  Whitechapel,  London,  in  1680.  In  1699, 
when  the  School  of  Saint  Anne,  Soho  (R.  237),  was  founded  by 
"Five  Earnest  Laymen  for  the  Poore  Boys  of  the  Parish,"  it  was 
the  sixth  of  its  kind  in  England.  In  1699  the  "Society  for  the 
Promotion  of  Christian  Knowledge"  (S.P.C.K.)  was  founded  for 
the  purpose,  among  other  things,  of  establishing  catechetical 
schools  for  the  education  of  the  children  of  the  poor  in  the  princi- 
ples of  the  Established  Church  (R.  238  b).  To  develop  piety  and 
help  the  poor  to  lead  industrious,  upright,  self-respecting  lives, 
"to  make  them  loyal  Church  members,  and  to  fit  them  for 
work  in  that  station  of  life  in  which  it  had  pleased  their 
Heavenly  Father  to  place  them,"  were  the  principal  objects 
of  the  Society. 

All  were  taught  reading,  spelUng,  and  the  Catechism,  and  in- 
struction in  writing  and  arithmetic  might  be  added.  The  train- 
ing might  also  be  coupled  with  that  of  the  "schools  of  industry" 
(workhouse  schools,  as  described  by  Locke  [R.  217])  to  augment 
the  economic  efficiency  of  the  boy.  Girls  seem  to  have  been 
provided  for  almost  equally  with  boys,  and,  in  addition  to  being 
taught  to  read  and  spell,  were  taught  "to  knit  their  Stockings 


Fig.  53. 
A  Charity- 
ScHOOL  Girl 
IN  Uniform 

Saint  Anne's, 
Soho,  England 


THEORY  AND  PRACTICE  BY  1750         241 

and  Gloves,  to  Mark,  Sew,  and  make  and  mend  their  Cloathes." 
Both  boys  and  girls  were  usually  provided  with  books  and  cloth- 
ing, a  regular  uniform  being 
worn  by  the  boys  and  girls 
of  each  school. 

The  chief  motive  in  the  estab- 
lishment of  these  schools, 
though,  was  to  decrease  the 
"Prophaness  and  Debauch- 
ery .  .  .  owing  to  a  gross 
Ignorance  of  the  Christian 
Religion"  (R.  237)  and  to 
educate  "Poor  Children  in 
the  Rules  and  Principles  of 
the  Christian  Religion  as  pro- 
fessed and  taught  in  the  Church 
of  England."  From  England 
the  charity-school  idea  was 
early  carried  to  the  Anglican 
Colonies  in  America  and  be- 
came a  fixed  institution  in  New 
Jersey,  Pennsylvania,  Dela- 
ware, Maryland,  and  some- 
what in  the  Colonies  farther  south.  In  the  Pennsylvania  con- 
stitution of  1790  we  find  the  following  directions  for  the  estab- 
lishment of  a  state  charity-school  system  to  supplement  the 
parish  schools  of  the  churches: 

Sec.  I.  The  legislature  shall,  as  soon  as  conveniently  may  be, 
provide,  by  law,  for  the  establishment  of  schools  throughout  the 
State,  in  such  manner  that  the  poor  may  be  taught  gratis. 

The  first  Pennsylvania  school  law  of  1802  carried  this  direction 
into  effect  by  providing  for  pauper  schools  in  the  counties,  a 
condition  that  was  not  done  away  with  until  1834.  In  New 
Jersey  the  system  lasted  until  1838. 

The  private-adventure,  or  "  hedge,"  school.  This  was  a 
school  analogous  to  the  Dame  School,  but  was  kept  by  a  man 
instead  of  a  woman,  and  usually  at  his  home  or  shop.  Ofttimes 
the  school  was  kept  secretly,  to  avoid  church  or  state  inspection, 
and  then  was  known  as  a  "hedge  school."  The  term  soon  came 
to  be  applied  to  any  kind  of  a  poor  school,  taught  in  an  irreg- 


FiG.  54. 

A  Charity-School 

Boy  in  Uniform 

Saint  Anne's, 
Soho,  England 


242       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

ular  manner  or  place.  Similar  irregular  schools,  under  equiva- 
lent names,  also  were  found  in  German  lands,  the  Netherlands, 
and  in  France,  while  in  the  American  Colonies  "indentured_ 
white  servants"  were  frequently  let  out  as  schoolmasters. 
The  following  advertisement  of  a  teacher  for  sale  is  typical 
of  private-adventure  elementary  school-keeping  during  the  col- 
onial period.     These  schools  were  taught  by  itinerant  school- 


To  Be  DISPOSED  of, 

A  Likely  Servant  Mans  Time  for  4  Years 
who  is  very  well  Qualified  for  a  Clerk  or  to  teach 
a  School,  he  Reads,  Writes,  underftands  Arithmetick  aod 
Accompts  very  well,  Enquire  of  the  Printer  hereof. 


»-■■ 


Fig.  55.  Advertisement  for  a  Teacher  to  let 
(From  the  American  Weekly  Mercury  of  Philadelphia,  1735) 

keepers,  artisans,  and  tutors  of  the  poorer  type,  but  offered  the 
beginnings  of  elementary  education  to  many  a  child  who  other- 
wise would  never  have  been  able  to  learn  to  read.     In  the  early 
eighteenth  century  these  schools  attained  a  remarkable  develop- 
ment in  England. 

A  new  influence  of  tremendous  future  importance  —  general 
reading  —  was  now  coming  in ;  the  vernacular  was  fast  supplant- 
ing Latin ;  newspapers  were  being  started ;  little  books  or  pam- 
phlets (tracts)  containing  general  information  were  being  sold; 
books  for  children  and  beginners  were  being  written;  the  popular 
novel  and  story  had  appeared;  and  all  these  educative  forces 
were  creating  a  new  and  a  somewhat  general  desire  for  a  knowl- 
edge of  the  art  of  reading.  This  in  turn  caused  a  new  demand 
for  schools  to  teach  the  long-locked-up  art,  and  this  demand  was 
capitalized  to  the  profit  of  many  types  of  people. 

The  apprenticing  of  orphans  and  children  of  the  poor.  The 
compulsory  apprenticing  of  the  children  of  the  poor  to  a  trade 
or  to  work  was  an  old  English  institution,  and  workhouse  train- 
ing, or  the  so-called  "schools  of  industry,"  became,  by  the  eight- 
eenth century,  a  prominent  feature  of  the  English  care  of  the 
poor.  These  represented  the  only  form  of  education  supported 
by  taxation,  and  the  only  form  of  education  to  which  Parliament 
gave  any  attention  during  the  whole  of  the  eighteenth  century. 
This  type  of  institution  also  was  carried  to  the  Anglican  Colo- 


THEORY  AND  PRACTICE  BY  1750         243 

nies  in  America,  as  we  have  seen  in  the  documents  for  Virginia  (R. 
200  a),  and  became  an  established  institution  in  America  as  well. 

The  apprenticing  of  boys  to  a  trade,  a  still  older  institution, 
was  also  much  used  as  a  means  for  training  youths  for  a  life  in  the 
trades,  not  only  in  England  and  the  American  Colonies,  but 
throughout  all  European  lands  as  well.  The  conditions  surround- 
ing the  apprenticing  of  a  boy  had  by  the  eighteenth  century  be- 
come quite  fixed.  The  "  Indenture  of  Apprenticeship  "  was  drawn 
up  by  a  lawyer,  and  by  it  the  master  was  carefully  bound  to  clothe 
and  feed  the  boy,  train  him  properly  in  his  trade,  look  after  his 
morals,  and  start  him  in  life  at  the  end  of  his  apprenticeship.  This 
is  well  shown  in  the  many  records  which  have  been  preserved, 
both  in  England  (R.  242)  and  the  American  Colonies  (R.  201). 
For  many  boys  this  type  of  education  was  the  best  possible  at  the 
time,  and  worthily  started  the  possessor  in  the  work  of  his  trade. 

Methods  of  instruction.  Throughout  the  eighteenth  century 
the  method  of  instruction  commonly  employed  in  the  vernacular 
schools  was  what  was  known  as  the  individual  method.  This  was 
wasteful  of  both  time  and  effort,  and  unpedagogical  to  a  high  de- 
gree (R.  244).  Everywhere  the  teacher  was  engaged  chiefly  in 
hearing  recitations,  testing  memory,  and  keeping  order.  The 
pupils  came  to  the  master's  desk,  one  by  one  (see  Figure  37,  p.  177), 
and  recited  what  they  had  memorized.  Aside  from  imposing  dis- 
cipline, teaching  was  an  easy  task.  The  pupils  learned  the  as- 
signed lessons  and  recited  what  they  had  learned.  Such  a  thing 
as  methodology  —  technique  of  instruction  -^  was  unknown. 
The  dorninance  of  the  religious  motive,  too,  precluded  any  liberal 
attitude  in  school  instruction,  the  individual  method  was  time- 
consuming,  school  buildings  often  were  lacking,  and  in  general 
there  was  an  almost  complete  lack  of  any  teaching  equipment, 
books,  or  supplies.  Viewed  from  any  modern  standpoint  the 
schools  of  the  eighteenth  century  attained  to  but  a  low  degree  of 
efficiency  (R.  244).  The  school  hours  were  long,  the  schoolmas- 
ter's residence  or  place  of  work  or  business  was  commonly  used  as 
a  schoolroom,  and  such  regular  schoolrooms  as  did  exist  were 
dirty  and  noisy  and  but  poorly  suited  to  school  purposes.  Schools 
everywhere,  too,  were  ungraded,  the  school  of  one  teacher  being 
like  that  of  any  other  teacher  of  that  class. 

Hearing  lessons,  assigning  new  tasks,  setting  copies,  making 
quill  pens,  dictating  siims,  and  imposing  order  completely  ab- 
sorbed the  time  and  the  attention  of  the  teacher. 


244       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


School  discipline.  The  discipline  everywhere  was  severe,  "A 
boy  has  a  back;  when  you  hit  it  he  understands,"  was  a  favorite 
pedagogical  maxim  of  the  time.     Whipping-posts  were  sometimes 

set  up  in  the  schoolroom,  and  practically 
all  pictures  of  the  schoolmasters  of  the 
time  show  a  bundle  of  switches  near 
at  hand.  Boys  in  the  Latin  grammar 
schools  were  flogged  for  petty  offenses 
(R.  245),  The  ability  to  impose  order 
on  a  poorly  taught  and,  in  consequence, 
an  unruly  school  was  always  an  impor- 


FiG.  56.  A  School 
Whipping-Post 

Drawn  from  a  picture  of  a  five- 
foot  whipping-post  which  once 
stood  in  the  floor  of  a  school- 
house  at  Sunderland,  Massa- 
chusetts. Now  in  the  Deerfield 
Museum. 

tant  requisite  of  the 
schoolmaster.  ASwab- 
ian  schoolmaster,  Hau- 
berle  by  name,  with 
characteristic  Teutonic 
attention  to  details,  has 
left  on  record  ^  that,  in 
the  course  of  his  fifty- 
one  years  and  seven 
months  as  a  teacher 
he  had,  by  a  moder- 
ate computation,  given 
911,527  blows  with  a 
cane,  124,010  blows 
with  a  rod,  20,989  blows 
and  raps  with  a  ruler, 

^  Barnard,  Henry.  Trans- 
lated from  Karl  von  Raumer; 
in  his  American  Journal  oj 
Education,  vol.  v,  p.  509. 


Fig.  57.  An  Eighteenth-Century  German 
School 

Reproduction  of  an  engraving  by  J.  Mettenleiter, 
now  in  the  Kupferstichkabinet,  Munich,  and  printed 
in  Joh.  Ferd.  Schlez's  Dorfschulen  zu  Langenhausen, 
Nuremberg,  1795, 


THEORY  AND  PRACTICE  BY  1750         245 

136,715  blows  with  the  hand,  10,235  blows  over  the  mouth, 
7905  boxes  on  the  ear,  1,115,800  raps  on  the  head,  and  22,763 
notabenes  with  the  Bible,  Catechism,  singing  book,  and  grammar. 
He  had  777  times  made  boys  kneel  on  peas,  613  times  on  a  triangu- 
lar piece  of  wood,  had  made  3001  wear  the  jackass,  and  1707  hold 
the  rod  up,  not  to  mention  various  more  unusual  punishments  he 
had  contrived  on  the  spur  of  the  occasion.  Of  the  blows  with  the 
cane,  800,000  were  for  Latin  words;  of  the  rod  76,000  were  for 
texts  from  the  Bible  or  verses  from  the  singing  book.  He  also  had 
about  3000  expressions  to  scold  with,  two  thirds  of  which  were 
native  to  the  German  tongue  and  the  remainder  his  invention. 

Pedagogical jvriters  of  the  time  uniformly  complain  of  the  se- 
vere discipline  of  the  schools,  and  the  literature  of  the  period 
abounds  in  allusions  to  the  prevailing  harshness  of  the  school  dis- 
cipline. A  few  writers  condemn,  but  most  approve  heartily  of  the 
use  of  the  rod.  "  Spare  the  rod  and  spoil  the  child  "  had  for  long 
been  a  well-grounded  pedagogical  doctrine. 

Conditions  surrounding  childhood.  It  is  difficult  for  us  of  to- 
day to  re-create  in  imagination  the  pitiful  life-conditions  which 
surrounded  children  a  century  and  a  half  ago.  Often  the  lot  of 
the  children  of  the  poor,  who  then  constituted  the  great  bulk  of 
all  children,  was  little  less  than  slavery.  Wretchedly  poor,  dirty, 
unkempt,  hard-worked,  beaten  about,  knowing  strong  drink 
early,  iUiterate,  often  vicious  —  their  lot  was  a  sad  one.  For  the 
children  of  the  poor  there  were  few,  if  any,  educational  opportuni- 
ties. 

In  the  towns  children  were  apprenticed  out  early  in  life,  and  for 
long  hours  of  daily  labor.  Child  welfare  was  almost  entirely  neg- 
lected, children  were  cuffed  about  and  beaten  at  their  work,  juve- 
nile deHnquency  was  a  common  condition,  child  mortality  was 
heavy,  and  ignorance  was  the  rule.  Schools  generally  were  pay 
institutions  or  a  charity,  and  not  a  birthright,  and  usually  existed 
only  for  the  middle  and  lower-middle  classes  in  the  population 
who  were  attendants  at  the  churches  and  could  afford  to  pay  a 
little  for  the  schooling  given.  Reading  and  religion  were  usually 
the  only  free  subjects.  Only  in  the  New  England  Colonies,  where 
the  beginnings  of  town  and  colony  school  systems  were  evident, 
and  in  a  few  of  the  German  States  where  state  control  was  begin- 
ning to  be  exercised,  was  a  better  condition  to  be  foimd. 

Among  the  middle  and  upper  social  classes,  particularly  on 
the  continent  of  Europe,  a  stiff  artificiality  everywhere  prevailed. 


246       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

Children  were  dressed  and  treated  as  miniature  adults,  the  normal 
activities  of  childhood  were  suppressed,  and  the  natural  interests 
and  emotions  of  children  found  little  opportunity  for  expression. 
Wearing  powdered  and  braided  hair,  long  gold-braided  coats,  em- 
broidered waistcoats,  cockaded  hats,  and  swords,  boys  were 
treated  more  as  adults  than  as  children.  Girls,  too,  with  their 
long  dresses,  hoops,  powdered  hair,  rouged  faces,  and  demure 
manner,  were  trained  in  a,  for  children,  most  unnatural  man- 
ner. The  dancing  master  for  their  manners  and  graces,  and  the 
religious  instructor  to  develop  in  them  the  ability  to  read  and 
to  go  through  a  largely  meaningless  ceremonial,  were  the  chief 
guides  for  the  period  of  their  childhood. 

School  support.  No  uniform  plan,  in  any  country,  had  as  yet 
been  evolved  for  even  the  meager  support  which  the  schools  of  the 
time  received.  The  Latin  grammar  schools  were  in  nearly  all 
cases  supported  by  the  income  from  old  "foundations"  and  from 
students'  fees,  with  here  and  there  some  state  aid.  The  new  ele- 
mentary vernacular  schools,  though,  had  had  assigned  to  them 
few  old  foundations  upon  which  to  draw  for  maintenance,  and  in 
consequence  support  for  elementary  schools  had  to  be  built  up 
from  new  sources,  and  this  required  time. 

We  thus  find  in  most  lands  endowed  elementary  schools, 
parish  schools,  dame  schools,  private-adventure  schools  of  many 
t3^es,  and  charity-schools,  all  existing  side  by  side,  and  draw- 
ing such  support  as  they  could  from  endowment  funds,  parish_ 
rates,  church  tithes,  subscriptions,  and  tuition  fees.  The  support 
of  schools  by  subscription  lists  (R.  240)  was  a  very  common  pro- 
ceeding. Education  in  England,  more  than  in  any  other  Protes- 
tant land,  early  came  to  be  regarded  as  a  benevolence  which  the 
State  was  under  no  obligation  to  support.  Only  workhouse 
schools  were  provided  for  by  the  general  taxation  of  all  property. 

In  the  Netherlands  and  in  German  lands  church  funds,  town 
funds,  and  tuition  fees  were  the  chief  means  of  support,  though~ 
here  and  there  some  prince  had  provided  for  something  approach- 
ing state  support  for  the^chools  of  his  little  principality.  Fred- 
erick the  Great  had  ordered  schools  established  generally  (1763) 
and  had  decreed  the  compulsory  attendance  of  children  (R.  274), 
but  he  had  depended  largely  on  church  funds  and  tuition  fees  (§7) 
for  maintenance,  with  a  proviso  that  the  tuition  of  poor  and  or- 
phaned children  should  be  paid  from  "any  funds  of  the  church  or 
town,  that  the  schoolmaster  may  get  his  income  "  (§8).    In  Scot- 


THEORY  AND  PRACTICE  BY  1750         247 

land  the  churclj  parish  school  was  the  prevailing  type.  In  France 
the  religious  societies  (p.  183)  provided  nearly  all  the  elementary 
vernacular  religious  education  that  was  obtainable. 

Beginnings  of  state  control  and  maintenance.  In  the  Dutch 
Provinces,  in  the  New  England  Colonies,  and  in  some  of  the  minor 
German  States  and  in  Switzerland  we  find  the  clearest  examples 
of  the  beginnings  of  state  control  and  maintenance  of  elementary 
schools  —  something  destined  to  grow  rapidly  and  in  the  nine- 
teenth-Century  take  over  the  school  from  the  Church  and  main- 
tain it  as  a  function  of  the  State.  The  Prussian  kings  early  made 
grants  of  land  and  money  for  endowment  funds  and  support,  and 
state  aid  was  ordered  granted  by  Maria  Theresa  for  Austria  (R. 
274  a),  in  1774.  In  the  New  England  Colonies  the  separation  of 
the  school  from  the  Church,  and  the  beginnings  of  state  support 
and  control  of  educatTon,  found  perhaps  their  earliest  and  clearest 
exemplification.  In  the  other  Colonies  the  lottery  was  much 
used  (R.  246)  to  raise  funds  for  schools,  while  church  tithes,  sub- 
scription lists,  and  school  societies  after  the  English  pattern  also 
helped  in  many  places  to  start  and  support  a  school  or  schools. 

Only  by  some  such  means  was  it  possible  in  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury that  the  children  of  the  poor  could  ever  enjoy  any  opportuni- 
ties for  education.  The  parents  of  the  poor  children,  themselves 
uneducated,  could  hardly  be  expected  to  provide  what  they  had 
never  come  to  appreciate  themselves.  On  the  other  hand,  few  of 
the  well-to-do  classes  felt  under  any  obligation  to  provide  educa- 
tion for  children  not  their  own.  There  was  as  yet  no  realization 
that  the  diffusion  of  education  contributed  to  the  welfare  of  the 
State,  or  that  the  ignorance  of  the  masses  might  be  in  any  way  a 
public  peril.  This  attitude  is  well  shown  for  England  by  the  fact 
that  not  a  single  law  relating  to  the  education  of  the  people,  aside 
from  workhouse  schools,  was  enacted  by  Parliament  during  the 
whole  of  the  eighteenth  century.  The  same  was  true  of  France 
until  the  coming  of  the  Revolution.  It  is  to  a  few  of  the  German 
States  and  to  the  American  Colonies  that  we  must  turn  for  the 
beginnings  of  legislation  directing  school  support.  This  we  shall 
describe  more  in  detail  in  later  chapters. 

The  Latin  Secondary  School.  The  great  progress  made  in  edu- 
cation during  the  eighteenth  century,  nevertheless,  was  in  ele- 
mentary education.  Concerning  the  secondary  schools  and  the 
universities  there  is  little  to  add  to  what  has  previously  been  said. 
During  this  century  the  secondary  school,  outside  of  German 


248        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


Fig.  58.  A  Pennsylvania  Academy 

York  Academy,  York,  Pennsylvania, 
founded  by  the  Protestant  Episcopal 
Church,  in  1787. 


lands,  remained  largely  stationary.  Having  become  formal  and 
lifeless  in  its  teaching  (p.  150),  and  in  England  and  France 
crushed  by  religious-uniformity  legislation  (p.  172),  the  Latin 
grammar  school  of  England  and  the  surviving  colleges  in  France 
practically  ceased  to  exert  any  influence  on  the  national  life. 

Rise  of  the  Academy  in  America.  As  we  have  seen  (p.  193), 
the  English  Latin  grammar  school  was  early  (1635)  carried  to  New 
England,  and  set  up  there  and  elsewhere  in  the  Colonies,  but  after 

the  close  of  the  seventeenth 
century  its  continued  main- 
tenance was  something  of  a 
struggle.  Particularly  in  the 
central  and  southern  colonies, 
where  commercial  demands 
early  made  themselves  felt,  the 
tendency  was  to  teach  more 
practical  subjects.  This  tend- 
ency led  to  the  evolution,  about 
the  middle  of  the  eighteenth 
century,  of  the  distinctively^ 
American  Academy,  with  a 
more  practical  curriculum,  and  by  the  close  of  the  century  it 
was  rapidly  superseding  the  older  Latin  grammar  school. 

Though  still  deeply  religious,  these  schools  usually  were  free 
from  denominationalism.  Though  retaining  the  study  of  Latin, 
they  made  most  of  new  subjects  of  more  practical  value.  A  study 
of  real  things  rather  than  words  about  things,  and  a  new  emphasis 
on  the  native  EngHsh  and  on  science  were  prominent  features  of 
their  work.  They  were  also  usually  open  to  girls,  as  well  as  boys, 
—  an  innovation  in  secondary  education  before  almost  wholly 
unknown.  Many  were  organized  later  for  girls  only.  These 
institutions  were  the  precursors  of  the  American  public  high 
school,  itself  a  type  of  the  most  democratic  institution  for  second- 
ary education  the  world  has  ever  known. 

End  of  the  transition  period.  We  have  now  reached,  in  our 
study  of  the  history  of  educational  progress,  the  end  of  the  transi- 
tion period  which  marked  the  change  in  thinking  from  mediaeval 
to  modern  attitudes.  The  period  was  ushered  in  with  the  begin- 
nings of  the  Revival  of  Learning  in  Italy  in  the  fourteenth  cen- 
tury, and  it  may  fittingly  close  about  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth. 
We  now  stand  on  the  threshold  of  a  new  era  in  world  history 


THEORY  AND  PRACTICE  BY  1750         249 

The  same  questioning  spirit  that  animated  the  scholars  of  the 
Revival  of  Learning,  now  full-grown  and  become  bold  and  self- 
confident,  is  about  to  be  applied  to  affairs  of  politics  and  govern- 
ment, and  we  are  soon  to  see  absolutism  and  mediaeval  attitudes 
in  both  Church  and  State  questioned  and  overthrown.  New 
political  theories  are  to  be  advanced,  and  the  divine  right  of  the 
people  is  to  be  asserted  and  established  in  England,  the  American 
Colonies,  and  in  France,  and  ultimately,  early^in  the  twentieth 
century,  we  are  to  witness  the  final  overthrow  of  the  divine-right- 
of-kings  idea  and  a  world-wide  sweep  of  the  democratic  spirit. 
A  new  human  and  political  theory  as  to  education  is  to  be  evolved ; 
the  school  is  to  be  taken  over  from  the  Church,  vastly  expanded 
in  scope,  and  made  a  constructive  instrument  of  the  State;  and 
the  wonderful  nineteenth  century  is  to  witness  a  degree  of  human, 
scientific,  political,  and  educational  progress  not  seen  before  in 
all  the  days  from  the  time  of  the  Crusades  to  the  opening  of  the 
nineteenth  century.  .It  is  to  this  wonderful  new  era  in  world 
history  that  we  now  turn. 

QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

1.  Contrast  a  religious  elementary  school,  with  the  Catechism  as  its  chief 
textbook,  with  a  modern  public  elementary  school. 

2.  Contrast  the  elementary  schools  of  Mulcaster  and  Comenius. 

3.  To  what  extent  did  the  religious  teachings  of  the  time  support  Locke's 
ideas  as  to  the  disciplinary  conception  of  education? 

4.  Do  we  to-day  place  as  much  emphasis  on  habit  formation  as  did  Locke? 
On  character?     On  good  breeding? 

5.  State  some  of  the  reasons  for  the  noticeable  weakening  of  the  hold  of  the 
■  old  religious  theory  as  to  education,  in  Protestant  lands,  by  the  middle 

of  the  eighteenth  century. 

6.  How  do  you  explain  the  slow  evolution  of  the  elementary  teacher  into  a 
position  of  some  importance?  Is  the  evolution  still  in  process?  Illus- 
trate. 

7.  What  were  the  motives  behind  the  organization  of  the  religious  charity- 
schools? 

8.  Show  how  tax-supported  workhouse  schools  represented,  for  England, 
the  first  step  in  public-school  maintenance. 

9.  Show  that  teaching  under  the  individual  method  of  instruction  was 
school  keeping,  rather  than  school  teaching. 

10.  How  do  you  explain  the  general  prevalence  of  harsh  discipline  well  into 
the  nineteenth  century? 

11.  Did  any  other  country  have,  in  the  eighteenth  century,  so  mixed  a  type 
of  elementary  education  as  did  England?  Why  was  it  so  badly  mixed 
there? 

12.  Show  how  the  Enghsh  Act  of  Conformity,  of  1662,  stifled  the  English 
Latin  grammar  schools. 

13.  What  reasons  were  there  for  the  development  of  the  more  practical 
Academy  in  America,  rather  than  in  England? 

14.  Compare  the  American  Academy  with  the  German  Realschule. 


250       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  selections,  illustrative 
of  the  contents  of  this  chapter,  are  reproduced: 

226.  Mulcaster:  Table  of  Contents  of  his  Positions. 

227.  Locke:  On  the  Teaching  of  Latin. 

228.  Locke:  On  the  Bible  as  a  Reading  Book. 

229.  Coote-Dilworth:  Two  early  "Spelling  Books." 

230.  Webster:  Description  of  Pre-Revolutionary  Schools. 

231.  Raumer:  Teachers  in  Gotha  in  1741. 

232.  Raumer:  An  i8th  Century  Swedish  People's  School. 

233.  Raumer :  Schools  of  Frankf urt-am-Main  during  the  Eighteenth  Cen- 
tury. 

234.  Kriisi:  A  Swiss  Teacher's  Examination  in  1793. 

235.  Crabbe;  White;  Shenstone:  The  English  Dame  School  described. 

236.  Newburgh:  A  Parochial-School  Teacher's  Agreement. 

237.  Saint  Anne:  Beginnings  of  an  English  Charity  School. 

238.  Regulations:  Charity-School  Organization  and  Instruction. 

(o)  Qualifications  for  the  Master. 
{b)  Purpose  and  Instruction. 

239.  Allen  and  McClure:  Textbooks  used  in  English  Charity-Schook. 

240.  England:  A  Charity-School  Subscription  Form. 

241.  Southwark:  The  Charity-School  of  Saint  John's  Parish. 

242.  Gorsham:  An  Eighteenth-Century  Indenture  of  Apprenticeship. 

243.  Indenture:  Learning  the  Trade  of  a  Schoolmaster. 

244.  Diesterweg:  The  Schools  of  Germany  before  Pestalozzi. 

245.  England:  Free  School  Rules,  1734. 

246.  Murray:  A  New  Jersey  School  Lottery. 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

Allen,  W.  O.  B.,  and  McClure,  E.     Two  Hundred  Years;  History  of  the 

S.P.C.K.,  J698-1898. 
Barnard,  Henr}-.     English  Pedagogy,  Part  11,  The  Teacher  in  English 
Literature. 
*Birchenough,  C.    History  of  Elementary  Education  in  England  and  Wales. 
Brown,  E.  E.     The  Making  of  our  Middle  Schools. 
Cardwell,  J.  F.     The  Story  of  a  Charity  School. 
Davidson,  Thos.     Rousseau. 
*Earle,  Alice  M.     Child  Life  in  Colonial  Days. 
Field,  Mrs.  E.  M.     The  Child  and  his  Book. 
Ford,  Paul  L.     The  New  England  Primer. 
Godfrey,  Elizabeth.     English  Children  in  the  Olden  Time. 
*Johnson,  Clifton.    Old  Time  Schools  and  School  Books. 
*Kemp,  W.  W.    The  Support  of  Schools  in  Colonial  New  York  by  the  Society 
for  the  Propagation  of  the  Gospel  in  Foreign  Parts. 
Kilpatrick,  Wm.  H.    Dutch  Schools  of  New  Netherlands  and  Colonial  New 

York. 
Locke,  John.     Some  Thoughts  Concerning  Education  (1693). 
*Montmorency,  J.  E.  G.  de.     Progress  of  Education  in  England. 
Montmorency,  J.  E.  G.  de.     State  Intervention  in  English  Education. 
Mulcaster,  Richard.     Positions.     (London,  1581.) 
*Paulsen,  Friedrich.     German  Education,  Past  and  Present. 
*Salmon,  David.     "The  Education  of  the  Poor  in  the  Eighteenth  Cen- 
tury"; reprinted  from  the  Educational  Record.     (London,  1908.) 
*Scott,  J.  F.    Historic  Essays  on  Apprenticeship  and  Vocational  Education. 
(Ann  Arbor,  1914.) 


PART  IV 
MODERN  TIMES 


THE  ABOLITION  OF  PRIVILEGE 

THE  RISE  OF  DEMOCRACY 

A  NEW  THEORY  FOR  EDUCATION  EVOLVED 

THE  STATE  TAKES  OVER  THE  SCHOOL 


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CHAPTER  XIX 
THE  EIGHTEENTH  A  TRANSITION  CENTURY 

The  eighteenth  century  a  turning-point.  The  eighteenth  cen- 
tury, in  human  thinking  and  progress,  marks  for  most  western 
nations  the  end  of  mediaevalism  and  the  ushering-in  of  modem 
forms  of  intellectual  liberty.  The  indifference  to  the  old  religious 
problems,  which  was  clearly  manifest  in  all  countries  at  the  be- 
ginning of  the  century,  steadily  grew  and  culminated  in  a  revolt 
against  ecclesiastical  control  over  human  affairs.  This  change  in 
attitude  toward  the  old  problems  permitted  the  rise  of  new  t>pes 
of  intellectual  inquiry,  a  rapid  development  of  scientific  thinking 
and  discovery,  the  growth  of  a  consciousness  of  national  problems 
and  national  welfare,  and  the  bringing  to  the  front  of  secular 
interests  to  a  degree  practically  unknown  since  the  days  of  ancient 
Rome.  In  a  sense  the  general  rise  of  these  new  interests  in  the 
eighteenth  century  was  but  a  culmination  of  a  long  series  of  move- 
ments looking  toward  greater  intellectual  freedom  and  needed 
human  progress  which  had  been  under  way  since  the  days  when 
studia  generalia  and  guilds  first  arose  in  western  Europe.  The 
rise  of  the  universities  in  the  thirteenth  and  fourteenth  centuries, 
the  Revival  of  Learning  in  the  fourteenth  and  fifteenth  centuries, 
the  Protestant  Revolts  in  the  sixteenth,  the  rise  of  modern  scien- 
tific inquiry  in  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth,  and  Puritanism  in 
England  and  Pietism  in  Germany  in  the  seventeenth,  had  all  been 
in  the  nature  of  protests  against  the  mediaeyatl  tendency  to  con- 
fine and  limit  and  enslave  the  intelleci..  In  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury the  culmination  of  this  rising  tide  of  protest  came  in  a  gen- 
eral and  determined  revolt  against  despotism  in  either  Church  or 
State,  which,  at  the  close  of  the  century,  swept  away  ancient  priv- 
ileges, abuses,  and  barriers,  and  prepared  the  way  for  the  marked 
intellectual  and  human  and  poUtical  progress  which  characterized 
the  nineteenth  centur>\ 

Significance  of  the  change  in  attitude.  The  new  spirit  and 
interests  and  attitudes  which  came  to  characterize  the  eighteenth 
centurj'  in  the  more  progressive  western  nations  meant  the  ulti- 
mate overthrow  of  the  tyranny  of  mediaeval  supernatural  the- 
ology, the  evolution  of  a  new  theory  as  to  moral  action  which 


254       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

should  be  independent  of  theology,  the  freeing  of  the  new  scien- 
tific spirit  from  the  fetters  of  church  control,  the  substituting  of 
new  philosophical  and  scientific  and  economic  interests  for  the 
old  theological  problems  which  had  for  so  long  dominated  human 
thinking,  the  substitution  of  natural  political  organization  for  the 
older  ecclesiastical  foundations  of  the  State,  the  destruction  of 
what  remained  of  the  old  feudal  political  system,  the  freeing  of 
the  serf  and  the  evolution  of  the  citizen,  and  the  rise  of  a  modern 
society  interested  in  problems  of  national  welfare  —  government 
in  the  interest  of  the  governed,  commerce,  industry,  science,  eco-_ 
nomics,  education,  and  social  welfare.  The  evolution  of  such 
modern-type  governments  inevitably  meant  the  creation  of  en- 
tirely new  demands  for  the  education  of  the  people  and  for  far- 
reaching  political  and  social  reforms. 

This  new  eighteenth-century  spirit,  which  so  characterized  the 
mid-eighteenth  century  that  it  is  often  spoken  of  as  the  "Period 
of  the  Enlightenment,"  expressed  itself  in  many  new  directions, 
a  few  of  the  more  important  of  which  will  be  considered  here  as 
of  fundamental  concern  for  the  student  of  the  history  of  educa- 
tional progress.  In  a  very  real  sense  the  development  of  state 
educational  systems,  in  both  European  and  American  States,  has 
been  an  outgrowth  of  the  great  liberalizing  forces  which  first  made 
themselves  felt  in  a  really  determined  way  during  this  important 
transition  century.  In  this  chapter  we  shall  consider  briefly  five 
important  phases  of  this  new  eighteenth-century  liberahsm,  as 
follows: 

1.  The  work  of  the  benevolent  despots  of  continental  Europe  in 
trying  to  shape  their  governments  to  harmonize  them  with  the 
new  spirit  of  the  century. 

2.  The  unsatisfied  demand  for  reform  in  France. 

3.  The  rise  of  democratic  government  and  liberalism  in  England. 

4.  The  institution  of  constitutional  government  and  religious  free- 
dom in  America. 

5.  The  sweeping  away  of  mediaeval  abuses  in  the  great  Revolution 
in  France.  ^ 

I.  WORK  OF  THE  BENEVOLENT  DESPOTS  OF  CONTINENTAL 

EUROPE 

The  new  nationalism  leads  to  interested  government.  In  Eng- 
land, as  we  shall  trace  a  little  further  on,  a  democratic  form  of 
government  had  for  long  been  developing,  but  this  democratic 
Jife  had  made  but  little  headway  on  the  continent  of  Europe. 


EIGHTEENTH  A  TRANSITION  CENTURY    255 

There,  instead,  the  democratic  tendencies  which  showed  some 
slight  signs  of  development  during  the  sixteenth  century  had  been 
stamped  out  in  the  period  of  warfare  and  the  ensuing  hatreds  of 
the  seventeenth,  and  in  the  eighteenth  century  we  find  autocratic 
government  at  its  height.  National  governments  to  succeed  the 
earlier  government  of  the  Church  had  developed  and  grown 
strong,  the  kingly  power  had  everywhere  been  consolidated, 
Church  and  State  were  in  close  working  alliance,  and  the  new 
spirit  of  nationality  —  in  government,  foreign  policy,  languages, 
literature,  and  culture  —  was  being  energetically  developed  by 
those  resp)onsible  for  the  welfare  of  the  States.  Everywhere,  al- 
most, on  the  continent  of  Europe,  the  theory  of  the  divine  right 
of  kings  to  rule  and  the  divine  duty  of  subjects  to  obey  seemed  to 
have  become  fixed,  and  this  theory  of  government  the  Church  now 
most  assiduously  supported.  Unlike  in  England  and  the  Ameri- 
can Colonies,  the  people  of  the  larger  countries  of  continental 
Europe  had  not  as  yet  advanced  far  enough  in  personal  Uberty 
or  political  thinking  to  make  any  demand  of  consequence  for  the 
right  to  govern  themselves.  The  new  spirit  of  nationality  abroad 
in  Europe,  though,  as  well  as  the  new  humanitarian  ideas  begin- 
ning to  stir  thinking  men,  alike  tended  to  awaken  a  new  interest 
on  the  part  of  many  rulers  in  the  welfare  of  the  people  they 
governed.  In  consequence,  during  the  eighteenth  century^  we 
find  a  number  of  nations  in  which  the  rulers,  putting  themselves 
in  harmony  with  the  new  spirit  of  the  time,  made  earnest  attempts 
to  improve  the  condition  of  their  peoples  as  a  means  of  advancing 
the  national  welfare.  We  shall  here  mention  the  four  nations  in 
which  the  most  conspicuous  reform  work  was  attempted. 

The  rulers  of  Prussia.  Three  kings,  to  whom  the  nineteenth- 
century  greatness  of  Prussia  was  largely  due,  ruled  the  countiy 
during  nearly  the  whole  of  the  eighteenth  century.  They  were 
fully  as  despotic  as  the  kings  of  France,  but,  unlike  the  French 
kings,  they  were  keenly  alive  to  the  needs  of  the  people,  anxious 
to  advance  the  welfare  of  the  State,  tolerant  in  religion,  and  in 
sympathy  with  the  new  scientific  studies.  The  first,  Frederick 
William  I  (1713-40),  labored  earnestly  to  develop  the  resources 
of  the  country,  trained  a  large  army,  ordered  elementary  education 
made  compulsory,  and  made  the  beginnings  in  the  royal  provinces 
of  the  transformation  of  the  schools  from  the  control  of  the 
Church  to  the  control  of  the  State.  His  son,  known  to  history 
as  Frederick  the  Great,  ruled  from  1740  to  1786.  During  his  long 


256        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

reign  he  labored  continually  to  curtail  ancient  privileges,  abolish 
old  abuses,  and  improve  the  condition  of  his  people. 

His  rule,  though,  was  thoroughly  autocratic.  ''Everything 
for  the  people,  but  nothing  by  the  people,"  was  the  keynote  of  his 
policies.  He  had  no  confidence  in  the  ability  of  the  people  to 
rule,  and  gave  them  no  opportunity  to  learn  the  art.  He  em- 
ployed the  strong  army  his  father  built  up  to  wage  wars  of  con- 
quest, seize  territory  that  did  not  belong  to  him,  and  in  conse- 
quence made  himself  a  great  German  hero.  He  may  be  said  to 
have  laid  the  foundations  of  modern  militarized,  socialized,  obedi- 
ently educated,  and  subject  Germany,  and  also  to  have  begun  the 
*' grand-larceny"  and  " scrap-of -paper "  policy  which  has  charac- 
terized Prussian  international  relationships  ever  since.  Freder- 
ick William  II,  who  reigned  from  1786  to  1797,  continued  in  large 
measure  the  enlightened  policies  of  his  uncle,  reformed  the  tax 
system,  lightened  the  burdens  of  his  people,  encouraged  trade,  ^ 
emphasized  the  German  tongue,  quickened  the  national  spirit, 
actively  encouraged  schools  and  universities,  and  began  that 
centralization  of  authority  over  the  developing  educational  sys- 
tem which  resulted  in  the  creation  in  Prussia  of  the  first  modern 
state  school  system  in  Europe.  The  educational  work  of  these 
three  Prussian  kings  was  indeed  important,  and  we  shall  study  it 
more  in  detail  in  a  later  chapter  (chapter  xxii). 

The  Austrian  reformers.  Two  notably  benevolent  rulers  occu- 
pied the  Austrian  throne  for  half  a  century,  and  did  much  to 
improve  the  condition  of  the  Austrian  people.  A  very  remarkable 
woman,  Maria  Theresa,  came  to  the  throne  in  1740,  and  was  fol- 
lowed by  her  son,  Joseph  II,  injjSo.  He  ruled  until  i^QO-  To 
Maria  Theresa  the  Austria  of  the  nineteenth  century  owed  most  of 
its  development  and  power.  She  worked  with  seemingly  tireless 
energy  for  the  advancement  of  the  welfare  of  her  subjects,  and 
toward  the  close  of  her  reign  laid,  as  we  shall  see  in  a  later  chap- 
ter, the  beginnings  of  Austrian  school  reform . 

Joseph  II  carried  still  further  his  mother's  benevolent  work, 
and  strove  to  introduce  " enlighteiiment  and  reason"  into  the 
administration  of  his  realm.  A  student  of  the  writings  of  the 
eighteenth-century  reform  philosophers,  and  deeply  imbued  with 
the  reform  spirit  of  his  time,  he  attempted  to  abolish  ancient 
privileges,  establish  a  uniform  code  of  justice,  encourage  educa- 
tion, free  the  serfs,  aboUsh  feudal  tenure,  grant  religious  tolera^- 
tion,  curb  the  power  of  the  Pope  and  the  Church,  break  the  power 


EIGHTEENTH  A  TRANSITION  CENTURY     257 

of  the  local  Diets,  centralize  the  State,  and  "introduce  a  uniform 
level  of  democratic  simplicity  under  his  own  absolute  sway."  He 
attempted  to  alter  the  organization  of  the  Church,  aboUshed  six 
hundred  monasteries,  and  reduced  the  number  of  monastic  per- 
sons in  his  dominion  from  63,000  to  27,000.  Attempting  too 
much,  he  brought  down  upon  his  head  the  wrath  of  both  priest 
and  noble  and  died  a  disappointed  man.  ^ 

The  Spanish  reformers.  A  very  similar  result  attended  the 
reform  efforts  of  a  succession  of  benevolent  rulers  thrust  upon 
Spain,  during  the  eighteenth  century,  by  the  cornpHcations  of  for- 
eign politics.  Over  a  period  of  nearly  ninety  years,  extending 
from  the  accession  of  Philip  V  (1700)  to  the  death  of  Charles  III 
(1788),  remarkable  political  progress  was  imposed  by  a  succession 
of  able  ministers  and  with  the  consent  of  the  kings.  The  power 
of  the  Church,  always  the  crying  evil  of  Spain,  was  restricted  in 
man^ways;  the  Inquisition  was  curbed;  the  Jesuits  were  driven 
from  the  kingdom;  the  burning  of  heretics  was  stopped;  prosecu- 
tion for  heresy  was  reduced  and  discouraged;  the  monastic  orders 
were  taught  to  fear  the  law  and  curb  their  passions;  evils  in  public 
adrninistration  were  removed;  national  grievances  were  redressed; 
the  civil  service  was  improved;  science  and  literature  were  en- 
couraged, in  place  of  barren  theological  speculations;  and  an  ear- 
nest effort  was  made  to  regenerate  the  national  life  and  improve 
the  lot  of  the  common  people. 

All  these  reforms,  though,  were  imposed  from  above,  and  no 
attempt  was  made  to  introduce  schools  or  to  educate  the  people 
in  the  arts  of  self-government.  The  result  was  that  the  reforms 
never  went  beneath  the  surface,  and  the  national  life  of  the  peo- 
ple remained  largely  untouched.  Within  five  years  of  the  death 
of  Charles  III  ^1  had  been  lost.  Under  a  native  Spanish  king, 
thoroughly  orthodox,  devout,  and  lacking  in  any  broad  national 
outlook,  the  Church  easily  restored  itself  to  power,  the  priests 
resumed  their  eariier  importance,  the  nobles  again  began  to  exact 
their  full  toll,  free  discussion  was  forbidden,  scientific  studies 
were  abandoned,  the  universities  were  ordered  to  discontinue  the 
study  of  moral  philosophy,  and  the  political  and  social  reforms 
which  had  required  three  generations  to  build  up  were  lost  in 
half  a  decade.  Not  meeting  any  well-expressed  need  of  the  peo- 
ple, and  with  no  schodis  provided  to  show  to  the  people  the  de- 
sirable nature  of  the  reforms  introduced,  it  was  easy  to  sweep 
them  aside.     In  this  relapse  to  mediaevalism,  the  chance  for 


258       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

Spain  —  a  country  rich  in  possibilities  and  natural  resources  — 
to  evolve  early  into  a  progressive  modern  nation  was  lost.  So 
Spain  has  remained  ever  since,  and  only  in  the  last  quarter  of  a 
century  has  reform  from  within  begun  to  be  evident  in  this  until 
recently  priest-ridden  and  benighted  land. 

The  intelligent  despots  of  Russia.  The  greatest  of  these  were 
Peter  the  Great,  who  ruled  from  1689  to  1725,  and  Catherine  II, 
who  ruled  from  1262  to  1796.  Catching  something  of  the  new 
eighteenth-century  western  spirit,  these  rulers  tried  to  introduce 
some  western  enlightenment  into  their  as  yet  almost  barbarous 
land.  Each  tried  earnestly  to  lift  their  people  to  a  higher  level 
of  Hying,  and  to  start  them  on  the  road  toward  civiUzation  and 
learning.  By  a  series  of  edicts,  despotically  enforced,  Peter  tried 
to  introduce  the  civilization  of  the  western  world  into  his  country. 
He  brought  in  numbers  of  skilled  artisans,  doctors,  merchants, 
teachers,  printers,  and  soldiers;  introduced  many  western  skills 
and  trades;  and  made  the  beginnings  of  western  secondary  edu- 
cation for  the  governing  classes  by  the  estabhshment  in  the  cities 
of  a  number  of  German-type  gymnasia.  Later  Catherine  II  had 
the  French  philosopher  Diderot  (p.  278)  draw  up  a  plan  for  her 
for  the  organization  of  a  state  system  of  higher  schools,  but  the 
plan  was  never  put  into  effect.  The  beginnings  of  Russian  higher 
civilization  really  date  from  this  eighteenth- century  work.  The 
power  of  the  formidable  Greek  or  Eastern  Church  remained,  how- 
ever, untouched,  and  this  continued,  until  after  the  Russian  revo- 
lution of  191 7,  as  one  of  the  most  serious  obstacles  to  Russian 
intellectual  and  educational  progress.  The  serfs,  too,  remained 
serfs  —  tied  to  the  land,  ignorant,  superstitious,  and  obedient. 

By  the  close  of  the  eighteenth  century  Russia,  largely  under 
Prussian  training,  had  become  a  very  formidable  military  power, 
and  by  the  close  of  the  nineteenth  century  was  beginning  to  make 
some  progress  of  importance  in  the  artj  of  peace.  Just  at  present 
Rjissia  is  going  through  a  stage  of  national  evolution  quite  com- 
parable to  that  which  took  place  in  France  a  century  and  a  quar- 
ter ago,  and  the  educational  importance  of  this  great  people,  as 
we  shall  point  out  further  on,  lies  in  their  future  evolution  rather 
than  in  any  contribution  they  have  as  yet  made  to  western 
development. 


EIGHTEENTH  A  TRANSITION  CENTURY    259 

II.  THE  UNSATISFIED  DEMAND  FOR  REFORM  IN  FRANCE 
The  setting  of  eighteenth-century  France.  Eighteenth-century 
France,  on  the  contrary,  developed  no  benevolent  despot  to  miti- 
gate abuses,  reform  the  laws,  aboHsh  privileges,  temper  the  rule 
of  the  Church  (R.  247),  curb  the  monastic  orders,  develop  the 
natural  resources,  begin  the  establishment  of  schools,  and  allevi- 
ate the  hard  lot  of  the  serf  and  the  peasant.  "I  am  the  State," 
exclaimed  the  king,  Louis  XIV,  and  the  almost  unlimited 
despotism  of  the  King  and  his  ministers  and  favorites  fully  sup- 
ported the  statement.  Local  liberties  had  been  suppressed,  and 
the  lot  of  the  common  people  —  ignorant,  hard-working,  down- 
trodden, but  intensely  patriotic  —  was  wretched  in  the  extreme. 
Approximately  140^000  nobles  and  130,000  monks,  nuns,  and 
clergy  owned  two  fifths  of  the  landed  property  of  France,  and 
controlled  the  destinies  of  a  nation  of  approximately  25,000,000 
people. 

Church  and  State  were  in  close  working  alliance.  The  higher 
offices  of  the  Church  were  commonly  held  by  appointed  noblemen, 
who  drew  large  incomes,  led  worldly  Uves,  and  neglected  their 
priestly  functions  much  as  the  ItaUan  appointees  in  German 
lands  had  done  before  the  Reformation.  A  king,  constantly  in 
need  of  money;  an  idle,  selfish,  corrupt,  nobility  and  upper  clergy, 
incapable  of  aiding  the  king,  many  of  whom,  too,  had  been  influ- 
enced by  the  new  philosophic  and  scientific  thinking  and  were 
willing  to  help  destroy  their  own  orders;  an  aggressive,  discon- 
tented, and  patriotic  bourgeoisie,  full  of  new  political  and  social 
ideas,  and  patriotically  anxious  to  reform  France;  and  a  vast 
unorganized  peasantry  and  city  rabble,  suffering  much  and 
resisting  Httle,  but  capable  of  a  terrible  fury  and  senseless 
destruction,  once  they  were  aroused  and  their  suppressed  rage 
let  loose;  —  these  were  the  main  elements  in  the  setting  of 
eighteenth-century  France. 

The  French  reform  philosophers.  During  the  middle  decades 
of  the  eighteenth  century  a  small  but  very  influential  group  of 
reform  philosophers  in  France  attacked  with  their  pens  the  an- 
cient abuses  in  Church  and  State,  and  did  much  to  pave  the  way 
for  genuine  poUtical  and  religious  reform.  In  a  series  of  widely 
read  articles  and  books,  characterized  for  the  most  part  by  clear 
reasoning  and  telling  arguments,  these  political  philosophers 
attacked  the  power  of  the  absolute  monarchy  on  the  one  hand, 


260       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

and  the  existing  privileges  of  the  nobles  and  clergy  on  the  other, 
as  both  unjust  and  inimical  to  the  welfare  of  society  (R.  248 ;  249) . 
The  leaders  in  the  reform  movement  were  Montesquieu  (1689- 
i755)>Turgot  (1727-81),  Voltaire  (1694-1778), Diderot  (1713-84), 
and  Rousseau  (1712-78). 

A  revolution  in  French  thinking.  These  five  men  —  Montes- 
quieu, Turgot,  Voltaire,  Diderot,  and  Rousseau  —  and  many 
other  less  influential  followers,  portrayed  the  abuses  of  the  time 
in  Church  and  State  and  pointed  out  the  lines  of  politjcal  end 
ecclesiastical  reform.  Those  who  read  their  writmgs  understood 
better  why  the  existing  privileges  of  the  nobility  and  clergy  were 
no  longer  right,  and  the  need  for  reform  in  matters  of  taxation 
and  government.  Their  writings  added  to  the  spirit  of  unrest 
of  the  century,  and  were  deeply  influential,  not  only  in  France, 
but  in  the  Arnerican  Colonies  as  well.  Though  the  attack  was 
at  first  against  the  evils  in  Church  and  State,  the  new  critical 
philosophy  soon  led  to  intellectual  developments  of  importance 
in  many  other  directions. 

At  the  death  of  Louis  XIV  (17 15)  France  was  intellectually 
prostrate.  Great  as  was  his  long  reign  from  the  point  of  view  of 
the  splendor  of  his  court,  and  large  as  was  the  quantity  of  litera- 
ture produced,  his  age  was  nevertheless  an  age  of  misery,  religious 
intolerance,  political  oppression,  and  intellectual  decline.  It  was 
a  reign  of  centralized  and  highly  personal  government.  Men  no 
longer  dared  to  tlunk  for  themselves,  or  to  discuss  with  any  free- 
dom questions  either  of  politics  or  religion.  "There  was  no  popu^^^ 
lar  liberty;  there  were  no  great  men;  there  was  no  science;  there 
was  no  Hterature;  there  were  no  arts.  The  largest  intellects  lost 
their  energy;  the  national  spirit  died  away."  Between  the  death 
of  Louis  XIV  and  the  outbreak  of  the  French  Revolution  {^-^^g)_ 
an  intellectual  revolution  took  place  in  France,  and  for  this  revo- 
lution English  political  progress  and  political  and  scientific  think- 
ing were  largely  responsible. 

Great  English  influence  on  France.  In  17 15  the  English  lan- 
guage was  almost  unspoken  in  France,  English  science  and  polit- 
ical progress  were  unknown  there,  and  the  English  were  looked 
down  upon  and  hated.  Half  a  century  later  English  was  spoken 
everywhere  by  the  scholars  of  the  time;  the  English  were  looked 
upon  as  the  political  and  scientific  leaders  of  Europe;  and  the 
scholars  of  France  visited  England  to  study  English  political, 
economic,  and  scientific  progress.     Locke,  an  uncompromising 


EIGHTEENTH  A  TRANSITION  CENTURY    261 

advocate  of  political  and  religious  liberty;  Hobbes,  the  specula- 
tive moral  philosopher;  and  the  great  scientist  Newton  were  the 
teachers  of  Voltaire.  More  than  any  other  single  man,  Voltaire 
moulded  and  redirected  eighteenth-century  thought  in  France. 
In  the  eighteenth  century  England  became  the  school  for  political 
liberty  for  France. 

The  effect  of  the  work  of  Isaac  Newton  (p.  208),  as  popularized 
by  the  writings  of  Voltaire,  was  revolutionary  on  a  people  who 
had  been  so  tyrannized  over  by  the  clergy  as  had  the  French 
during  the  reign  of  Louis  XIV.  An  interest  in  scientific  studies 
before  unknown  in  France  now  flamed  up,  and  a  new  generation 
of  French  scientists  arose.  Physics,  chemistry,  zoology,  and  anat- 
omy received  a  great  new  impetus,  while  botany,  geology,  and 
mineralogy  were  raised  to  the  rank  of  sciences.  Popular  scien- 
tific lectures  became  very  common.  The  classics  were  almost 
abandoned  for  the  new  studies.  Economic  questions  also  began 
to  be  discussed,  such  as  questions  of  money,  food,  finance,  and 
government  expenditure. 

In  the  meantime  taxes  piled  up,  reforms  were  refused,  the 
power  and  arrogance  of  the  clergy  and  nobihty  showed  no  signs 
of  dirninution,  the  nation  was  burdened  with  debt,  commerce  and 
agriculture  declined,  the  lot  of  the  common  people  became  ever 
more  hard  to  bear,  and  the  masses  grew  increasingly  resentful 
and  rebellious.  As  national  affairs  continued  to  drift  from  bad 
to  worse  in  France,  a  series  of  important  happenings  on  the 
American  continent  helped  to  bring  matters  more  rapidly  to  a 
crisis.  Before  describing  these  events,  however,  we  wish  to 
sketch  briefly  the  rise  of  government  by  the  people  and  the  ex- 
tension of  liberalism  in  England  —  the  fijst  great  democratic  na- 
tion of  the  western  world. 
A 

'       III.  ENGLAND  THE  FIRST  DEMOCRATIC  NATION 

Early  beginnings  of  English  liberty.  The  first  western  nation 
created  from  the  wreck  of  the  Roman  Empire  to  achieve  a  meas- 
urement of  self-government  was  England.  Better  civilized  than 
most  of  the  other  wandering  tribes,  at  the  time  of  their  coming 
to  English  shores,  the  invading  Angles,  Saxons,  and  Jutes  early 
accepted  Christianity  (597-635  a.d.)  and  settled  down  to  an  agri- 
cultural hfe.  On  EngUsh  shores  they  soon  built  up  a  for-the-time 
substantial  civilization.  This  was  later  largely  destroyed  by  the 
pillaging  Danes,  but  with  characteristic  energy  the  English  set  to 


262        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

work  to  assimilate  the  newcomers  and  build  up  civilization  anew. 
The  work  of  Alfred  in  reestablishing  law  and  order,  at  a  time 
when  law  and  order  scarcely  existed  anywhere  in  western  Europe, 
will  long  remain  famous.  Later  on,  and  at  a  time  when  German 
and  Hun  and  Slav  had  only  recently  accepted  Christianity  in 
name  and  had  begun  to  settle  down  into  rude  tribal  govern- 
ments, and  when  the  Prussians  in  their  original  home  along  the 
eastern  Baltic  were  still  offering  human  sacrifices  to  their  heathen 
gods,  the  English  barons  were  extorting  Magna  Charta  from 
King  John  and  laying  the  firm  foundations  of  English  constitu- 
tional liberty.  In  the  meadow  at  Runnymede,  on  that  justly 
celebrated  June  day,  in  121 5,  government  under  law  and  based 
on  the  consent  of  the  governed  began  to  shape  itself  once  more 
in  the  western  world.  Of  the  sixty-three  articles  of  this  Charter 
of  Liberties,  three  possess  imperishable  value.    These  provided : 

1.  That  no  free  manshall  be  imprisoned  or  proceeded  against  except 
by  his  peerSf  or  the  law-of  the  land,  which  secured  trial  by  jury. 

2.  That  justice  should  neither  be  sold,  denied,  nor  delayed. 

3.  That  dues  from  the  people  to  the  king  could  be  imposed  only  with 
the  consent  of  the  National  Council  (after  1246  known  as  Parlia- 
ment). 

So  important  was  this  charter  to  such  a  liberty-loving  people  as 
the  English  have  always  been,  and  so  bitterly  did  kings  resent  its 
hampering  provisions,  that  within  the  next  two  centuries  kings 
had  been  forced  to  confirm  it  no  less  than  thirty-seven  times. 

By  1 295  the  first  complete  Parliament,  representative  of  the 
three  orders  of  society  —  Lords,  Clergy,  and  Commons  —  assem- 
bled, and  in  1333  the  Commons  gained  the  right  to  sit  by  itself. 
From  that  time  to  the  present  the  Commons,  representing  the 
people,  has  gradually  broadened  its  powers,  working,  as  Tenny- 
son has  said,  "from  precedent  to  precedent,"  until  to-day  it  rules 
the  English  nation.  In  1376  the  Commons  gained  the  right  to 
irnpeach  the  King's  ministers,  and  in  1407  the  exclusive  right  to 
make  grants  of  money  for  any  governmental  purpose.  Centuries 
ahead  of  other  nations,  this  insured  an  almost  continual  meeting 
of  the  national  assembly  and  a  close  scrutiny  of  the  acts  of  both 
kings  and  ministers. 

In  1604  King  Jarnes  I,  imitating  continental  European  prece- 
dents, proclaimed  his  theory  as  to  the  "divine  right  of  kings"  to 
rule,  and  a  struggle  at  once  set  in  which  carried  the  English  into 
Civil  War  (1642-49);  led  to  the  beheading  of  Charles  I  (1649); 


EIGHTEENTH  A  TRANSITION  CENTURY    263 

the  overthrow  and  banishment  of  James  II  (1688);  and  the  ulti- 
mate firm  establishment,  instead,  of  the  "divine  right  of  the 
common  people."  In  an  age  when  the  autocratic  power  and  the 
divine  right  of  kings  to  rule  was  almost  unquestioned  elsewhere 
in  Europe,  the  English  people  compgUed  their  king,  to  recognize 
that  he  could  rule  over  them  only  when  he  ruledjn  their  interests 
and  as  they  wished  him  to  do.  Though  there  was  a  period  of 
struggle  later  on  with  the  German.  Georges  (I,  II,  and  III),  and 
especially  with  the  honest  but  stupid  George  III,  England  has, 
since  1688,  been  a  government  of  and  by  the  people.  France 
did  not  rid  itself  of  the  "divine-right"  conception  until  the  French 
Revolution  (1789),  and  Germany,  Austria,  and  Russia  not  until 
1918. 

Growth  of  tolerance  among  the  English.  The  results  of  the 
long  struggle  of  the  English  for  liberty  under  law  showed  itself 
in  many  ways  in  the  growth  of  tolerance  among  the  people  of  the 
English  nation.  At  a  time  when  other  nations  were  bound  down 
in  bUnd  obedience  to  king  and  priest,  and  when  dissenting  minori- 
ties were  driven  from  the  land,  the  English  people  had  become 
accustomed  to  the  idea  of  individual  liberty,  regulated  by  law, 
and  to  the  toleration  of  opinions  with  which  they  did  not  agree. 
These  characteristically  English  conceptions  of  liberty  under  law 
and  of  the  toleration  of  minorities  have  found  expression  in  many 
important  ways  in  the  life  and  government  of  the  people  (R.  250), 
and  have  been  elements  of  great  strength  in  England's  colonial 
policy.  One  of  the  important  ways  in  which  this  growth  of  toler- 
ance among  the  English  showed  itself  was  in  the  extension  of  a 
larger  freedom  to  those  unable  to  subscribe  to  the  state  religion. 

Though  the  Reformation  moyement  had  stirred  up  bitter 
hatreds  in  England,  as  on  the  Continent,  the  English  were  among 
the  first  of  European  peoples  to  show  tolerance  of  opposition  in 
religious  matters.  The  high  English  State  Church,  which  had 
succeeded  the  Roman,  had  made  but  small  appeal  to  many  Eng- 
lishmen. The  Puritans  had  early  struggled  to  secure  a  simplifi- 
cation of  the  church  service  and  the  intrcxiuction  of  more  preach- 
ing (p.  192),  and  in  the  seventeenth  century  the  organization  of 
three  additional  dissenting  sects,  which  became  known  as  Unitari- 
ans, Baptists,  and  Quakers,  took  place.  These  sects  divided  off 
rather  quietly,  and  their  separation  resulted  only  in  the  enact- 
ment of  new  laws  regarding  conformity,  prayers,  and  teaching. 

During  the  latter  half  of  the  seventeenth  century,  after  the 


264       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

execution  of  Charles  I  (164c)),  the  Puritans  had  temporarily  risen 
to  power,  and  during  their  control  of  affairs  had  imposed  their 
strict  Calvinistic  standards  as  to  Sabbath  observance  and  piety 
on  the  nation.  This  was  very  distasteful  to  many,  and  from  such 
strict  observances  the  people  in  time  rebelled.  The  standards 
of  the  English  in  personal  morality,  temperance,  amusements, 
and  manners  at  the  beginning  of  the  eighteenth  century  were  not 
especially  high,  and  in  the  reaction  from  Puritan  coritrol  and 
strict  religious  observances  the  great  mass  of  the  people  degen- 
erated into  positive  irreligion  and  gross  immorality.  Drunken- 
ness, rowdyism,  robbery,  blasphemy,  brutality,  lewdness,  and 
prostitution  became  very  common.  This  moral  dechne  of  the 
people  the  Church  of  England  seemed  powerless  to  arrest. 

New  emancipating  and  educative  influences.  In  1662  the  first 
regular  newspaper  outside  of  Italy  was  established  in  England, 
and  in  1702  the  first  daily  paper.  SmaU  in  size,  printed  on 
but  one  side  of  the  sheet,  and  dealing  wholly  with  local  matters, 
these  nevertheless  marked  the  beginnings  of  that  daily  expression 
of  popular  opinion  with  which  we  are  now  so  familiar.  After 
about  1705  the  cheap  political  pamphlet  made  its  appearance, 
and  after  17 10,  instead  of  merely  communicating  news,  the  papers 
began  the  discussion  of  political  questions. 

By  1735  a  revolution  had  been  effected  in  England,  and  papers 
and  presses  began  to  be  established  in  the  chief  cities  and  towns 
outside  of  London;  the  freedom  of  the  press  was  in  a  large  way 
completed,  and  newspapers,  for  the  first  time  in  the  history  of  the 
world,  were  made  the  exponents  of  public  opinion.  The  press  in 
England  in  consequence  became  an  educative  force  of  great  intel- 
lectual and  political  importance,  and  did  much  to  compensate^ 
for  the  lack  of  a  general  system  of  schools  for  the  people.  In  1772. 
the  right  to  publish  the  debates  in  Parliament  was  finally  won, 
over  the  strenuous  objections  of  George  III.  In  1780  the  first 
Sunday  newspaper  appeared,  ''on  the  only  day  the  lower  orders 
had  time  to  read  a  paper  at  all,"  and,  despite  the  efforts  of  reli- 
gious bodies  to  suppress  it,  the  Sunday  paper  has  continued  to 
the  present  and  has  contributed  its  quota  to  the  education  and 
enlightenment  of  mankind.  In  1785  the  famous  London  Times 
began  to  appear.  In  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century  de- 
bating societies  for  the  consideration  of  public  questions  arose, 
and  in  1769  "the  first  public  meeting  ever  assembled  in  England, 
in  which  it  was  attempted  to  enlighten  EngUshmen  respecting 


EIGHTEENTH  A  TRANSITION  CENTURY    265 

their  political  rights"  was  held,  and  such  meetings  soon  became 
of  almost  daily  occurrence.  All  these  influences  stimulated  polit- 
ical thinking  to  a  high  degree,  and  contributed  not  only  to  a 
desire  for  still  larger  political  freedom  but  for  the  more  general 
diffusion  of  the  ability  to  read  as  well  (R.  250). 

Still  other  important  new  influences  arose  during  the  early  part 
of  the  eighteenth  century,  each  of  which  tended  to  awaken  new 
desires  for  schools  and  learning.  In  1678  the  first  modern  printed 
story  to  appeal  to  the  masses,  Bunyan's  Pilgrim's  Progress,  aj>- 
peared  from  the  press.  Written,  as  it  had  been,  by  a  man  of  the 
people,  its  simple  narrative  form,  its  passionate  religious  feeling, 
its  picture  of  the  journey  of  a  pilgrim  through  a  world  of  sin  and 
temptation  and  trial,  and  its  Biblical  language  with  which  the 
common  people  had  now  become  familiar  —  all  these  elements 
combined  to  make  it  a  book  that  appealed  strongly  to  all  who 
read  or  heard  it  read,  and  stimulated  among  the  masses  a  desire 
to  read  comparable  to  that  awakened  by  the  chaining  of  the 
English  Bible  in  the  churches  a  century  before  (R.  170).  In  171Q 
the  first  great  English  novel,  Defoe's  Robinson  Crusoe,  and  in 
1126  Gulliver's  Travels,  added  new  stimulus  to  the  desires  awak- 
ened by  Bunyan's  book.  AU  three  were  books  of  the  common 
people,  whereas  the  dramas,  plays,  essays,  and  scholarly  works 
previously  produced  had  appealed  only  to  a  small  educated  class. 
In  1^51  what  was  probably  the  first  circulating  library  of  modem 
times  was  opened  at  Birmingham,  and  soon  thereafter  similar 
institutions  were  established  in  other  English  cities. 

Science  and  manufacturing;  the  new  era.  England,  too,  fpom 
the  first,  showed  an  interest  in  and  a  tolerance  toward  the  new 
scientific  thinking  scarcely  found  in  any  other  land.  This  in 
itself  is  indicative  of  the  great  intellectual  progress  which  the 
English  people  had  by  this  time  made.  At  a  time  when  Galileo, 
in  Italy  (p.  208),  was  fighting,  almost  alone,  for  the  right  to  think 
along  the  lines  of  the  new  scientific  method  and  being  imprisoned_ 
for  his  pains,  Englishmen  were  reading  with  deep  interest  the 
epoch-making  scientific  writings  of  Lord  Francis  Bacon  (p.  209). 
Earlier  than  in  other  lands,  too,  the  Newtonian  philosophy 
found  a  place  in  the  mstruction  of  the  national  universities. 
Popular  presentations  of  what  had  been  worked  out  by  the 
scientists  were  sold  at  the  book  stalls  and  by  peddlers  and  were 
eagerly  read;  by  the  beginning  of  the  reign  of  George  III  (1760X 
they  had  become  very  common.    In  1704-10  the  first  ''Diction- 


266        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

ary  of  Arts  and  Sciences"  was  printed,  and  in  1668-71  the  first 
edition  (three  volumes)  of  the  now  famous  Encyclopcedia  Britan- 
nica  appeared.    In  1 7  5 5  the  famous  British  Museum  was  founded. 

As  early  as  1698  a  rude  form  of  steam  engine  had  been  patented 
in  England,  and  by  1 712  this  had  been  perfected  sufficiently  to  be 
used  in  pumping  water  from  the  coal  mines.  In  17^15^  Janies  WaJtt^ 
made  the  real  beginning  of  the  application  of  steam  to  industry 
by  patenting  his  steam  engine;  in  1760  Wedgwood  established  the 
pottery  industry  in  England;  in  1767  Hargreaves  devised  the 
spinning-jenny,  which  banished  the  spindle  and  distaff  and  the 
old  spinning-wheel;  in  1769  Arkwright  evolved  his  spinning- 
frame;  and  in  1785  Cartwright  completed  the  process  by  invent- 
ing the  power  loom  for  weaving.  In  1784  a  great  improvement 
in  the  smelting  of  iron  ores  (puddling)  was  worked  out.  These 
inventions,  all  English,  were  revolutionary  in  their  effect  on  man- 
ufacturing. They  meant  the  displacement  of  hand  power  by 
machine  labor,  the  breakdown  of  home  industry  through  the 
concentration  of  labor  in  factories,  the;  rise  of  great  manufacturing 
cities,  and  the  ultimate  collapse  of  the  age-old  apprenticeship 
system  of  training,  where  the  master  workman  with  a  few  appren- 
tices in  his  shop  (p.  109)  prepared  goods  for  sale.  They  also 
meant  the  ultimate  transformation  of  England  from  an  agricul- 
tural into  a  great  manufacturing  and  exporting  nation,  whose 
manufactured  products  would  be  sold  in  every  corner  of  the 
globe. 

By  1750  a  change  in  attitude  toward  all  the  old  intellectual 
problems  had  become  marked  in  Englgirid,  and  by  i775,attention 
before  unkn_own  was  being  given  there  to  social,  political,  eco- 
nomic, and  educational  questions.  Religious  intolerance  was 
dying  out,  the  harsh  laws  of  earlier  days  had  begun  to  be  modified, 
new  social  and  political  interests  were  everywhere  attracting^ 
attention,  and  the  great  commercial  expansion  of  England  was 
rapidly  taking  shape.  With  England  and  Fra-nce  leading  in  the 
new  scientific  studies;  England  in  the  van  in  the  development  of 
manufacturing  and  the  French  to  the  fore  in  social  influences 
and  polite  literature;  England  and  the  new  American  Colonies 
setting  new  standards  in  government  by  the  people;  the  French 
theorists  and  economists  giving  the  world  new  ideas  as  to  the 
function  of  the  State;  enlightened  despots  on  the  thrones  of  Prus- 
sia, Austria,  Spain,  and  Russia;  and  the  hatreds  of  the  hundred 
years  of  religious  warfare  djong  out;  the  world  seemed  to  many, 


EIGHTEENTH  A  TRANSITION  CENTURY     267 

about  1775,  as  on  the  verge  of  some  great  and  far-reaching  change 
in  methods  of  living  and  in  government,  and  about  ready  to  enter 
a  new  era  and  make  rapid  advances  in  nearly  all  lines  of  human 
activity.    The  change  came,  but  not  in  quite  the  manner  expected. 

IV.  INSTFTUTION  OF  CONSTITUTIONAL  GOVERNMENT  AnD 
RELIGIOUS  FREEDOM  IN  AMERICA 

Englishmen  in  America  establish  a  Republic.  Though  the 
early  settlement  of  America,  as  was  pointed  out  in  chapter  xv, 
was  made  from  among  those  people  and  from  those  lands  which 
had  embraced  some  form  of  the  Protestant  faith,  and  represented 
a  number  of  nationalities  and  several  religious  sects,  the  thirteen 
colonies,  nevertheless,  were  essentially  English  in  origin,  speech, 
habits,  observances,  and  political  and  religious  conceptions.  It 
was  from  England,  the  nation  which  had  done  most  in  the  devel- 
opment of  individual  and  religious  liberty,  that  the  great  bulk  of 
the  early  settlers^of  Anierica  came,  and  in  the  New  World  the 
English  traditions  as  to  constitutional  government  and  liberty 
under  law  were  early  and  firmly  established.  The  centuries  of 
struggle  for  representative  government  in  England  at  once  bore 
fruit  here.  Colony  charters,  charters  of  rights  and  liberties,  public 
discussion,  legislative  assemblies,  and  liberty  under  law  were  from 
the  first  made  the  foundation  stones  upon  which  self-government 
in  America  was  built  up.  ^ 

From  an  early  date  the  American  Colonies  sh(Twed  an  independ- 
ence to  which  even  Englishmen  were  scarcely  accustomed,  and 
when  the  home  government  attempted  to  make  the  colonists  pay 
some  of  the  expenses  of  the  Seven  Years'  War,  and  a  larger  share 
of  the  expenses  of  colonial  administration,  there  was  determined 
opposition.  Having  no  representation  in  Parliament  and  no 
voice  in  levying  the  tax,  the  colonists  declared  that  taxation  with- 
out representation  was  tyranny,  and  refused  to  pay  the  taxes 
assessed.  Standing  squarely  on  their  rights  as  Englishmen,  the 
colonists  were  gradually  forced  into  open  rebellion.  In  1765,  and 
again  in  1774,  Declarations  of  Rights  were  drawn  up  and  adopted 
by  representatives  from  the  Colonies,  and  were  forwarded  to  the 
King.  In  1774  the  first  Continental  Congress  met  and  formed  a 
union  of  the  Colonies;  in  1776  the  Colonies  declared  their  inde- 
pendence. This  was  confirmed,  in  1783,  by  the  Treaty  of  Paris; 
in  i787,__the  Constitution  of  the  United  States  was  drafted;  and 
^  in  1789,  the  American  government  began.     In  the  preamble  to 


268        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

the  twenty-seven  charges  of  tyranny  and  oppression  made  against 
the  King  in  the  Declaration  of  Independence,  we  find  a  statement 
of  political  philosophy  which  is  a  combination  of  the  results  of 
the  long  English  struggle  for  liberty  and  the  French  eighteenth- 
century  reform  philosophy  and  revolutionary  demands.  This 
preamble  declared: 

We  hold  these  truths  to  be  self-evident  —  that  all  men  are  created 
equal;  that  they  are  endowed  by  their  Creator  with  certain  unalien- 
able rights;  that  among  these  are  life,  liberty,  and  the  pursuit  of  happi- 
ness. That,  to  secure  these  rights,  governments  are  instituted  among 
men,  deriving  their  just  powers  from  the  consent  of  the  governed;  that^ 
whenever  any  form  of  government  becomes  destructive  of  these  ends, 
it  is  the  right  of  the  people  to  alter  or  to  abolish  it,  and  to  institute  a 
new  government,  laying  its  foundation  on  such  principles,  and  organiz- 
ing its  powers  in  such  form,  as  to  them  shall  seem  most  likely  to  effect 
their  safety  and  happiness. 

American  contributions  to  world  history.  The  American. 
Revolution  and  its  results  were  fraught  with  great  importance  for 
the  future  political  and  educational  progress  of  mankind.  Before 
the  close  of  the  eighteenth  century  the  new  American  government 
had  made  at  least  four  important  contributions  to  world  liberty 
and  progress  which  were  certain  to  be  of  large  poHtical  and  educa- 
tional value  for  the  future. 

In  the  first  place,  the  people  of  the  Colonies  had  erected  inde- 
pendfint  governments  and  had  shown  the  possibility  of  the  self- 
government  of  peoples  on  a  large  scale,  and  not  merely  in  little 
city-states  or  communities,  as  had  previously  been  the  case  where 
self-government  had  been  tried.  Democratic  government  was 
here  worked  out  and  appHed  to  large  areas,  and  to  peoples  of 
diverse  nationalities  and  embracing  different  religious  faiths. 
The  possibihty  of  States  selecting  their  rulers  and  successfully 
governing  themselves  was  demonstrated. 

In  the  second  place,  the  new  American  government  which  was. 
formed  did  something  new  in  world  history  when  it  united  thir- 
teen independent  and  autonomous  States  into  a  single  federated 
Nation,  and  without  destroying  the  independence  of  the  States. 
What  was  formed  was  not  a  league,  or  confederacy,  as  had  existed 
at  different  times  among  differing  groups  of  the  Greek  City- 
States,  and  from  time  to  time  in  the  case  of  later  Swiss  and  tem- 
porary European  national  groupings,  but  the  union  into  a  sub- 
stantial and  permanent  Federal  State  of  a  number  of  separate 
States  which  still  retained  their  independence,  and  with  provi- 


EIGHTEENTH  A  TRANSITION  CENTURY    269 

sion  for  the  expansion  of  this  national  Union  by  the  addition  of 
new  States.  This  federal  principle  in  government  is  probably 
the  greatest  political  contribution  of  the  American  Union  to  world 
development.  In  the  twentieth-century  conception  of  a  League 
otJ^ations  it  has  borne  still  further  fruit. 

In  the  third  place,  the  different  American^States  changed  their 
old  Colonial  Charters  into  definite  written  Constitutions,  each 
of  which  contained  a  Preamble,  or  Bill  of  Rights  which  affirmed 
the  fundamental  principles  of  democratic  Uberty  (R.  251).  These 
now  became  the  fundamental  law  for  each  of  the  separate  States, 
and  the  same  idea  was  later  worked  out  in  the  Coiistitution  of 
the  United^ States.  These  were  the  first  written  constitutions  of 
lustory,  and  have  since  served  as  a  tyf»e  for  the  creation  of  con-_ 
stitutional  government  throughout  the  world.  In  such  docu- 
ments to-day  free  peoples  everywhere  define  the  rights  and  duties 
and  obligations  which  they  regard  as  necessary  to  their  safety 
and  happiness  and  welfare. 

Finally,  the  new  Federal  Constitution  provided  for  the  inesti- 
mable boon  of  religious  liberty,  and  in  a  way  that  was  both  revo- 
lutionary and  wholesome.  The  complex  religious  problem  of 
America  had  to  be  met  by  the  Consti^tutional  Convention,  and 
this  body  handled  it  in  the  only  way  it  could  have  been  intelli- 
gently  handled  in  a  nation  composed  of  so  many  different  reli- 
gious sects  as  was  ours.  It  simply  incorporated  into  the  Federal 
Constitution  provisions  which  guaranteed  the  free  exercise  of 
their  religious  faith  to  all,  and  forbade  the  establishment  by  Con- 
gress of  any  state  religion,  or  the  requirement  of  any  religious 
test  as  a  prerequisite  to  holding  any  office  under  the  control  of 
the  Federal  Government.  The  American  people  thus  took  a 
stand  for  religious  liberty  at  a  time  when  the  hatreds  of  the 
Reformation  still  burned  fiercely,  and  when  tolerance  in  religious 
matters  was  as  yet  but  little  known. 

Importance  of  the  religious-liberty  contribution.  The  solution 
of  the  re^gious  question  arrived  at  was  only  second  in  importance 
for  us  to  the  establishment  of  the  Federal  Union,  and  the  far- 
reaching  significance  to  our  future  national  life  of  the  sane  and 
for-the-time  extraordinary  provisions  incorporated  into  our  Na- 
tional Constitution  can  hardly  be  overestimated.  This  action 
led  to  the  early  abandonment  of  state  rehgions,  religious  tests,  and 
public  taxation  for  religioiLin  the  old  States,  and  to  the  prohibi-- 
tion  of  these  in  the  new.     The  importance  of  this  solution  of  the 


270       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

religious  question  for  the  future^  of  popular  education  in  the 
United  States  was  great,  for  it  laid  the  foundations  upon  which 
our  systems  of  free,  common,  public,  tax-supported,  non-sectarian 
schools  have  since  been  built  up.  How  we  could  have  erected  a 
common  public-school  system  on  a  religious  basis,  with  the  many 
religious  sects  among  us,  it  is  impossible  to  conceive. 

How  much  the  American  people  owe  to  the  Fathers  of  the  Re-: 

public  for  this  most  enlightened  and  intelligent  provision,  few 
who  have  not  thought  carefully  on  the  matter  can  appreciate.  To 
it  we  must  trace  not  only  the  great  blessing  of  reUgious  liberty, 
which  we  have  so  long  enjoyed,  but  also  the  final  establishment  of 
our  common,  free,  public-school  systems.  The  beginning  of  the 
new  state  motive  for  education,  which  was  soon  to  supersede  the 
religious  motive,  dates  from  the  establishment  with  us  of  repuj^li- 
can  governments;  and  the  beginning  of  the  emancipation  of  edu- 
cation from  church  domination  goes  back  to  this  wise  provision 
inserted  in  our  National  Constitution. 

This  national  attitude  was  later  copied  in  the  state  constitu- 
tions, and  as  a  preamble  to  practically  all  we  find  a  Bill  of  Rights, 
which  in  almost  every  case  included  a  provision  for  freedom  of 
religious  worship  (Rs.  251,  260).  After  the  middle  of  the  nirwe-  _ 
teenth  century  a  further  provision  prohibiting  sectarian  teaching 
or  state  aid  to  sectarian  schools  was  everywhere  added. 

V.  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION  SWEEPS  AWAY  ANCIENT  ABUSES 

New  demands  for  reform  that  could  not  be  resisted.  More 
than  in  any  other  continental  European  country  France  had,  by 
1783,  become  a  united  nation,  conscious  of  a  modern  national 
feeling.  Yet  in  France  mediaeval  abuses  in  both  State  and 
Church  had  survived,  as  we  have  seen,  to  as  great  an  extent  al- 
most as  in  any  European  nation.  So  determined  were  the  clergy 
and  nobihty  to  retain  their  ojd  powejrs,  not  only  in  France  but 
throughout  the  contineiit  of  Europe  as  well,  that  progressive  re- 
form seemed  well-nigh  impossible.  The  work  of  the  benevolent 
despots  had,  after  all,  been  superficial.  By  the  last  quarter  of  the 
eighteenth,  though,  a  progressive  change  was  under  way  which 
was  certain  to  produce  either  evolution  or  revolution.  The  influ- 
ence of  the  American  experiment  in  nation-building  now  became 
pronounced.  In  1779  Franklin  took  a  copy  of  the  new  Pennsyl- 
vania Constitution  with  him  to  Paris,  and  in  1780  John  Adams  did 
the  same  with  the  Massachusetts  Constitution.     Frenchmen  in- 


EIGHTEENTH  A  TRANSITION  CENTURY     271 

stantly  recognized  here,  in  concrete  form,  the  ideas  with  which 
their  own  heads  were  filled.  In  i783jFraiikliil  published  in  France 
a_  French  tranjlation_of  aJLthcAoierican  Constitutions,  and  the 
National  Constitiition  of  1787  was  as  eagerly  read  and  discussed 
in  Paris  as  in  New_Y.Qrk  or  Philadelphia  or  Boston.  America 
appeared  to  the  French  of  that  stormy  period  as  an  ideal  land, 
where  the  dreams  of  Rousseau  about  the  social  contract  had  been 
transformed  into  realities.  .Two  years  later  the  cahiers  of  the 
Third  Estq,te  demanded  a  written  constitution  for  France.  The 
French,  too,  had  aided  the  American  Colonies  in  their  struggle 
for  liberty^  and  French  soldiers  returning  home  carried  back  new 
political  ideas  drawn  from  the  remarkable  p>olitlcal  progress  of  the 
new  American  Nation.  By  1788  the  demand  for  reform  in  France 
had  become  so  insistent,  and  the  condition  of  the  treasury  of  the 
State  was  so  bad,  that  it  was  finally  felt  necessary  to  summon  a 
meeting  of  the  States-General  —  a  sort  of  national  parliament 
consisting  of  representatives  of  the  three  great  Estates:  clergy, 
nobility,  and  commons  —  which  had  not  met  in  France  since 
1614. 

France  establishes  constitutional  government.  The  States- 
General  met  May  5,  1789,  and  soon  (June  20)  resolved  itself  into 
the  National  or  Constituent  Assembly.  Terrified  by  the  upris- 
ings and  burnings  of  chateaux  throughout  France,  on  the  night  of 
August  fourth,  in  a  few  hours,  it  adopted  a  series  of  decrees  which 
virtually  abolished  the  Ancien  Regime  of  privileges  for  France. 
The  nobility  gave  up  most  of  their  old  rights,  the  serfs  were 
freed,  and  the  special  privileges  of  towns  were  surrendered.  Later 
the  Assembly  adopted  a  "Declaration  of  Rights  of  Man  and  of 
the  Citizen"  (R.  253),  much  like  the  American  Declaration  of  In- 
dependence. This  declared,  among  other  things,  that  all  men 
were  born-free_^nd  have  ec[ual  rights,  that  taxes  should  be  propor- 
tional to  wealth,  that  all  citizens  were  equal  before  the  law  and 
have  a  right  to  help  make  the  laws,  and  that  the  people  of  the  na- 
tion were  sovereign.  These  principles  struck  at  the  very  founda- 
tions of  the  old  system. 

Soon  a  Constitution  for  France,  the  first  ever  promulgated  in 
modern  Europe,  was  prepared  and  adopted  (1791).  This  abol- 
ished the  ancient  privileges  and  reorganized  France  as  a  self-gov-_ 
eming  nation,  much  after  the  American  plan.  Local  government 
was  created,  and  the  absolute  monarchy  was  changed  to  a  limited 
constitutional  one.    Next  the  property  of  the  Church  was  taken 


272       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

over  by  the  State,  the  monasteries  were  suppressed,  and  the 
priests  and  bishops  were  made  state  officials  and  paid  a  fixed  state 
salafy.  The  Jesuits  had  been  expelled  from  France  in  1764;  and 
in  1792  the  Brothers  of  the  Christian  Schools  were  not  allowed 
longer  to  teach.  Among  other  important  matters,  the  Constitu- 
tion of  1 79 1  declared  that: 

There  shall  be  created  and  organized  a  system  of  public  instruction 
common  to  all  citizens,  and  gratuitous,  with  respect  to  those  branches 
of  instruction  which  are  indispensable  for  all  men. 

Up  to  this  point  the  Revolution  in  France  had  proceeded  rela- 
tively peacefully,  considering  the  nature  of  the  long-standing 
abuses  which  were  to  be  remedied.  In  August,  1792,  the  King 
was  imprisoned,  and  in  January,  1793,  he  was  executed  and  a  Re- 
pubHc  proclaimed.  Then  followed  a  reign  of  terror,  which  we  do 
not  need  to  follow,  and  which  ended  only  when  Napoleon  became 
master  of  France. 

Beneficent  results  of  the  Revolution.  The  French  Revolution 
was  not  an  accident  or  a  product  of  chance,  but  rather  the  inevita- 
ble result  of  an  attempt  to  dam  up  the  stream  of  human  progress 
and  prevent  its  orderly  onward  flow.  The  Protestant  Revolts 
were  the  first  great  revolutionary  wave,  the  Puritan  revolution  in 
England  was  another,  the  formation  of  the  American  Republic 
and  the  institution  of  constitutional  government  and  religious 
freedom  another,  while  the  French  Revolution  brought  the  rising 
movement  to  a  head  and  swept  away,  in  a  deluge  of  blood,  the 
very  foundations  of  the  mediaeval  system.  Along  with  much  that 
was  disastrous,  the  French  Revolution  accomplished  after  all 
much  that  was  of  greatest  importance  for  human  progress.  The 
world  at  times  seems  to  be  in  need  of  such  a  great  catharsis. 
Progress  was  made  in  a  decade  that  could  hardly  have  been  made 
in  a  century  by  peaceful  evolution.  The  old  order  of  privilege 
came  to  an  end,  mediaevahsm  was  swept  away,  and  the  serf  was 
evolved  into  the  free  farmer  and  citizen.  One  fifth  of  the  soil  of 
France  was  restored  to  the  use  of  the  people  from  the  monaster:i 
ies,  and  an  additional  one  third  from  the  Church  and  nobility. 
The  new  principles  of  citizenship  —  Liberty,  Equality,  and  Fra- 
ternity —  were  for  France  revolutionary  in  the  extreme,  while  the 
assertion  that  the  sovereignty  of  a  nation  rests  with  the  people 
rather  than  with  the  king,  here  successfully  promulgated,  ended 
for  all  time  the  "  divine-right-of -kings  "  idea  for  France.  After 
political  theory  had  for  a  time  run  mad,  the  organizing  genius  of 


EIGHTEENTH  A  TRANSITION  CENTURY    273 

NsBpleon  consolidated  the  gains,  gave  France  a  strong  govern- 
ment, a  umform  code  of  laws,  and  began  that  organization  of 
schools  for  the  nation  which  ultimately  meant  the  taking  over  of 
education  from  the  Church  and  its  provision  at  the  expense  of  and 
in  the  interests  of  the  nation. 

The  national  idea  extends  to  other  lands.  The  reform  work  in 
France,  together  with  the  examples  of  English  and  American  lib- 
erty, soon  began  to  have  their  influence  in  other  lands  as  well. 
People  everywhere  began  to  see  that  the  old  regime  of  privilege 
and  misgovemment  ought  to  be  replaced.  Other  countries  abol- 
ished  serfdom,  introduced  better  laws,  and  made  reforms  in  the 
abuses  of  both  Church  and  State.  French  armies  and  rulers  car- 
ried the  best  of  French  ideas  to  other  lands,  and.  where  the  French^ 
rule  continued  long  enough,  these  ideas  became  fixed.  In  particu- 
lar was  the  Code  Napoleon  copied  in  the  Netherlands,  the  Italian 
States,  and  the  States  of  southern  and  western  Germany.  The 
national^pirit  of  Italy  was  awakened,  and  the  Italian  hberals  be- 
gan to  look  forward  to  the  day  when  the  small  Italian  States  might 
be  reunited  into  an  Italian  Nation,  with  Rome  as  its  capital.  This 
became  the  work  of  nineteenth-century  ItaUan  statesmen.  For 
the  first  time  in  Spanish  history,  too,  the  people  became  conscious, 
under  French  occupation,  of  a  feeling  of  national  unity,  and  simij:. 
larly  the  national  spirit  of  German  lands  was  stirred  by  the  con- 
quests of  Napoleon. 

Important  consequences  of  the  democratic  movement.  Since 
the  closing  decades  of  the  eighteenth  century,  when  democratic 
government  and  written  constitutions  began,  the  sweep  of  demo^ 
cratic  government  has  become  almost  world  wide.  Nation  after 
nation  has  changed  to  democratic  and  constitutional  forms  of 
government,  the  latest  additions  being  Portugal  (191 1),  China 
(1912),  Russia  (1917),  and  Germany  (1918).  New  English  colo- 
nies, too,  have  carried  English  self-government  into  almost  every 
continent.  The  World  War  of  19 14-18  gave  a  new  emphasis  to 
democracy,  and  there  is  good  reason  to  believe  that  government 
of  and  by  and  for  the  people  is  ultimately  destined  to  prevail 
among  all  the  intelligent  nations  and  races  of  the  earth.  ~ 

With  the  development  of  democratic  government  there  has 
everywhere  been  a  softening  of  old  laws,  the  growth  of  humani- 
tarianism,  the  wider  and  wider  extension  of  the  suffrage,  impor- 
tanTlegislation  as  to  labor,  a  previously  unknown  attention  to  the 
poor  and  the  dependents  of  society,  a  vast  extension  of  educa- 


274       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

tional  advantages,  and  the  taking  over  of  education  from  the 
Church  by  the  State  and  the  erection  of  the  school  into  an  im- 
portant institution  for  the  preservation  and  advancement  of  the 
national  welfare.  These  consequences  of  the  onward  sweep  of 
new-world  ideas  we  shall  trace  more  in  detail  in  the  chapters 
which  follow.     V      .      \     ,  V- 

>Q^^  -t^UESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

1.  Snotfthe  importance,  for  human  progress,  of  each  of  the  meanings  of  the 
new  eighteenth-century  liberalism,  as  enumerated  on  pages  253-54. 

2.  How  do  you  explain  the  lack  of  any  permanent  influence  on  Spanish  life 
of  the  work  of  the  benevolent  despots  in  Spain? 

3.  Show  the  liberalizing  influence  of  the  rise  of  scientific  investigation  and 
economic  studies,  for  a  nation  still  oppressed  by  mediaevalism  and  bad 
government. 

4.  Enumerate  the  new  sciences  which  arose  in  the  eighteenth  century. 

5.  Indicate  the  importance  of  the  freedom  of  the  press  in  the  development 
of  English  political  liberty.  ' 

6.  Explain  how  the  religious-freedom  attitude  of  the  American  national 
constitution  conferred  an  inestimable  boon  on  the  States  in  the  matter 
of  public  education. 

SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  illustrative  selections. 
are  reproduced: 

247.  Dabney:  Ecclesiastical  Tyranny  in  France. 

248.  Voltaire:  On  the  Relation  of  Church  and  State. 

249.  Rousseau:  Ej^tract  from  the  Social  Contract. 

250.  Buckle:  Changes  in  English  Thinking  in  the  Eighteenth  Century^ 

251.  Pennsylvania  Constitution:  Bill  of  Rights  in. 

252.  Clergy  of  Blois:  Cahier  of  1779. 

253.  France:  Declaration  of  the  Rights  of  Man. 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

*Dabney,  R.  H.     The  Causes  of  the  French  Revolution. 
Taine,  H.  A.     The  Ancient  Regime. 


1i> 


i 


CHAPTER  XX 
THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  NATIONAL  EDUCATION 

I.  NEW  CONCEPTIONS  OF  THE  EDUCATIONAL  PURPOSE 

The  State  as  servant  of  the  Church.  With  the  rise  of  the  Prot- 
estant sects  we  noted,  in  the  fifteenth  and  sixteenth  centuries,  and 
for  the  first  time  since  Christianity  became  supreme  in  the  west- 
ern world,  the  beginnings  of  a  state  connection  with  the  education 
of  the  young.  The  Protestant  reformers,  obtaining  the  support 
of  the  Protestant  princes  and  kings>  Jiad  successfully  used  this 
support  to  assist  them  in  the  organization  of  church  schools  as  an 
aid  to  the  reformed  faith.  In  all  Prqtgstapt  lands  we  saw  that 
the  reformers  appealed,  from  time  to  time,  to  what  were  then 
the  servants  of  the  churches  —  the  rising  civil  governments  and 
principalities  and  States  —  to  use  their  civil  authority  to  force 
the  people  to  meet  their  new  religious  obligations  in  the  matter 
of  schooling. 

The  purpose  of  the  schooling  ordered  established,  however,  was 
almost  wholly  religious.  Massachusetts,  in  ordering  instruction 
in  the  "capital  laws  of  the  country',"  as  well  as  re'ading  and  re- 
ligion,  had  formed  a  marked  exception.  In  nearly  all  lands  the 
rising  gjtate  governments  merely  helped  the  Protestant  churches 
to  create  the  elementary  vernacular  religious  school,  and  to  make 
of  it  an  auxiliary  for  the  protection  of  orthodoxy  and  the  advance- 
ment of  the  faith.  This  condition  continued  until  well  toward 
the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century. 

The  new  state  theory  of  education.  After  about  the  middle  of 
the  eighteenth  century  a  new  theory  as  to  the  purpose  of  educa- 
tion, and  one  destined  to  make  ra42id  headway,  began  to  be  ad- 
vanced. This  theory  had  already  made  marked  progress,  as  we 
shall  see,  in  the  NewJ^ngland  Colonies,  and  had  also  found  ex- 
pression, as  we  shall  also  see  in  a  later  chapter,  in  the  organizing 
work  of  Frederick  the  Great  in  Prussia.  It  was  from  the  French 
political  philosophers  of  the  eighteenth  century,  though,  that  its 
clearest  definition  came.  They  now  advanced  the  idea  that 
schools  were  essentially  civil  affairs,  the  purpose  of  which  should 
be  to  promote  the  everyday  interests  of  society  and  the  welfare  of 
the  State,  rather  than  the  welfare  of  the  Church,  and  to  prepare 
for  a  life  h^e  rather  than  a  life  her^ter. 


276        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

The  outcome  was  the  rise  of  a  new  national  and  individual  con- 
ception of  the  educational  purpose.  This  was  destined  in  time  to 
spread  to  other  lands  and  to  lead  to  the  rise  of  complete  state 
school  systems,  fijianced  and  managed  by  the  State  and  conducted 
for  state  ends,  and  to  the  ultimate  divorce  of  Church  and  State,  in 
all  progressive  lands,  in  the  matter  of  the  education  of  the  young. 
Teachers  trained  and  certificated  by  the  State  were  in  time  to 
supplant  the  nuns  and  brothers  of  the  religious  congregations  in 
Catholic  lands,  as  well  as  teachers  who  served  as  assistants  to  the 
pastors  in  Protestant  lands  and  whose  chief  purpose  was  to  up- 
hold the  teachings  and  advance  the  interests  of  the  sect;  citizens 
were  to  supplant  the  ecclesiastic  in  the  supervision  of  instruction ; 
and  the  courses  of  instruction  were  to  be  changed  in  direction  and 
vastly  broadened  in  scope  to  make  them  minister  to  the  needs  of 
the  State  rather  than  the  Church,  and  to  prepare  pupils  for  useful 
life  here  rather  than  for  lif ejn  another  world, 

II.  THE  NEW  STATE  THEORY  IN  FRANCE 

The  French  political  theorists.  The  leading  French  political 
theorists  of  the  two  decades  between  1760 
and  1 780  now  began  to  discuss  education^ 
as  in  theory  a  civil  affair,  intimately  con- 
nected with  the  promotion  of  the  welfare 
of  the  State.  The  more  important  of 
these,  and  their  chief  ideas  were: 

I .  Rousseau.  The  first  of  the  critical  and 
reformatory  pedagogical  writers  to  awaken 
any  large  interest  and  obtain  a  general 
hearing  was  Jean- Jacques  Rousseau.  The 
same  year  (1762)  that  his  Social  Con- 
^^^'  {17  ^-78^^^^  ^/^<^  appeared  and  attacked  the  founda- 
tions of  the  old  political  system  his  Emile 
also  appeared  and  attacked  with  equal  vigor  the  religious  and 
social  theory  as  to  education  then  prevailing  throughout  western 
Europe.  For  the  stiff  and  unnatural  methods  in  education,  under 
which  children  were  dressed  and  made  to  behave  as  adults,  the 
harsh  discipline  of  the  time,  and  the  excessive  emphasis  on  religious 
instruction  and  book  education,  he  preached  the  substitution  of 
life  amid  nature,  childish  ways  and  sports,  parental  love^  and  an 
education  that  considered  the  instincts  and  natural  development 
of  children. 


BEGINNINGS  OF  NATIONAL  EDUCATION    2-]-] 

Gathering  up  the  political  and  social  ideas  of  his  age  as  to  ec- 
clesiastical and  political  despotism;  the  nature  of  the  social  con- 
tract; that  the  "  state  of  nature  "  was  the  ideal  one,  and  the  one  in 
which  men  had  been  intended  to  live;  that  human  duty  called  for 
a  return  to  the  "state  of  nature,"  whatever  that  might  be; 
and  that  the  artificiality  and  hypocrisy  of  his  age  in  marmgrs, 
dress,  religion,  and  education  were  all  wrong  —  Rousseau  re- 
stated his  poUtical  philosophy  in  terms  of  the  education  of 
the  boy,  Emile.  Despite  its  many  exagger- 
ations, much  faulty  reasoning,  and  many 
imperfections,  the  book  had  a  tremendous 
influence  upon  Europe  in  laying  bare  the 
limitations  and  defects  and  abuses  of  the 
formal  and  ecclesiastical  education  of  the 
time.  He  may  be  regarded  as  the  first  im- 
portant writer  to  sap  the  foundations  of 
the  old  system  of  religious  education,  and 
to  lay  a  basis  for  a  new  type  of  child 
training  (R.  254). 

2.  La  Chalotais.  The  year  following  the 
publication  of  Rousseau's  Emile  appeared 
La  Chalotais's  Essai  d'education  naiionale 
(1763).  La  Chalotais  produced  a  practical  and  philosophical  dis- 
cussion of  the  problem  of  the  education  of  a  people.  Declaring 
firmly  that  education  was  essentially  a  civil  affair;  that  it  was 

the  function  of  government  to  make 
citizens  contented  by  educating  them 
for  their  sphere  in  society;  that  citizen 
and  secular  teachers  should  not  be  ex- 
cluded  for  celibates;  that  the  real  pur- 
pose of  education  should  be  to  prepare 
citizens  for  France ;  that  the  poor  were 
deserving  of  education;  and  that  "the 
most  enlightened  people  will  always  have 
the  advantage"  in  the  struggles  of  a 
modern  world,  La  Chalolais  produced 
a  work  which  was  warmly  approved 
by  such  political  philosophers  as  Vol- 
taire, Diderot,  and  Turgot,  and  which 
was  translated  into  several  European  languages  (R.  255). 

3.  Rolland.     In  1768  Rolland,  president  of  the  Parliament  of 


7-7 

Fig.  60. 

La  Chalotais 
(1701-83) 


/^,;^^x 


Fig.  61.  Rolland 
(1734-93) 


278        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

Paris,  presented  to  his  colleagues  a  report  in  which  he  outlined  a 
national  system  of  education  to  replace  both  the  schools  of  the 
Jesuits  and  those  of  the  Brothers  of  the  Christian  Schools.  La 
Chalotais  had  proposed  a  more  modern  system  of  state  schools 
chiefly  to  replace  those  of  the  Jesuits,  but  Rolland  went  further 
and  proposed  the  extension  of  education  to  all,  and  the  supervi- 
sion of  all  schools  by  a  central  council  of  the  Government. 

4.  Turgot.  In  1774  Turgot  was  appointed  Minister  of  Finance 
(p.  260),  and  in  1775  he  made  a  series  of  recommendations  to  the 
King  in  which  he  set  forth  ideas  analogous  to  those  (rf  Rolland, 
and  presented  an  eloquent  plea  for  the  formation  of  a  national 
council  of  public  instruction  and  the  establishment  of  a  system  of 
civil  and  national  education  for  the  whole  of  France. 

5.  Diderot.  In  1776  Diderot,  editor  with  D'Alembert  of  the 
£«cyc/o/>^(/^a  (1751-72),  prepared,  at  the  request  of  Catherine  II 

(p.  258).  under  the  title  of  Plan  of  a  Uni- 
versity, a  complete  scheme  for  the  organi- 
zation of  a  state  system  of  public  instruc- 
tion for  Russia.  Though  the  plan  was 
never  carried  out,  it  was  printed  and  much 
discussed  in  France,  and  is  important  as 
coming  from  one  of  the  most  influential 
Frenchmen. /^  For  Russia  he  outlines  first 
a  system  of  people's  schools,  which  shall 
be  free  and  obligatory  for  all,  and  in  which 
instruction  in  reading,  writing,  arithmetic. 
Fig.  62.  Diderot  morals,  civics,  and  religion  shall  be  taught. 
"From  the  Prime  Minister  to  the  lowest 
peasant,"  he  says,  "it  is  good  for  every  one  to  know  how  to 
read,  write,  and  count."  For  the  series  of  secondary  schools  to 
be  established,  he  condemns  the  usual  practice  of  devoting  so 
much  of  the  instruction  to  the  humanities  and  a  mediaeval  type 
of  logic  and  ethics,  and  urges  instead  the  introduction  of  instruc- 
tion in  mathematics,  in  the  modern  sciences,  literature,  and  the 
work  of  governments.  Classical  studies  he  would  confine  to  the 
last  years  of  the  course.  Science,  history,  drawing,  and  music 
find  a  place  in  his  scheme. 

All  this  instruction  Diderot  would  place  under  the  supervisory 
control  of  an  administrative  bureau  to  be  known  as  the  University^ 
oj  Russia,  at  the  head  of  which  should  be  a  statesman,  who  should 
exercise  control  of  all  the  work  of  public  instruction  beneath. 


BEGINNINGS  OF  NATIONAL  EDUCATION    279 

Though  never  carried  out  in  Russia,  the  University  of  France  of 
1808  is  largely  an  embodiment  of  the  ideas  he  proposed  in  iT]6._ 

Legislative  proposals  to  embody  these  ideas.  During  the  quar- 
terpf  a  century  between  the  publication  of  Rousseau's  ^mile  and 
the  summoning  of  the  States-X?eneral  to  reform  France  (1762-88), 
the  educational  as  well  as  the  poUtical  ideas  of  the  French  reform- 
ers  had  taken  deep  root  with  the  thinking  classes  of  the  nation. 
The  cahiers  of  1789,  of  all  Orders  (p.  271),  gave  evidence  of  this 
in  their  somewhat  general  demand  for  the  creation  of  some  form 
of  an  educational  system  for  France  (R.  252).  From  the  first 
days  of  the  Revolution  p>edagogical  literature  became  plentiful, 
and  the  successive  National  Assemblies  found  time,  amid  the  in- 
ternal reorganization  of  France,  constitution-making,  the  trou- 
bles with  and  taaljof  .the  King,  and  the  darkening  cloud  of  foreign 
intervention,  to  Usten  to  reports  and  addresses  on  education  and 
to  enact  a  bill  for  the  organization  of  a  national  school  system. 
The  more  important  of  these  educational  efforts  were: 

I.  The  Constituent  Assembly  (June  17,  1789,  to  September  30, 
1791).  In  the  Constituent  Assembly,  into  which  the  States-Gen- 
eral resolved  itself,  June  17,  1789,  and 
which  continued  until  after  it  had  framed 
the  constitution  of  1791,  two  notable  ad- 
dresses and  one  notable  report  on  the 
orggjuzation  of  education  were  made.  The 
Count  de  Mirabeau,  a  nobleman  turned 
against  his  class  and  elected  to  the  States- 
General  as  a  representative  of  the  Third 
Estate,  made  addresses  on  the  "Organiza- 
tion of  a  Teaching  Body,"  and  on  the 
"Organization  of  a  National  Lyctey  In  the 
first  he  advocated  the  establishment  of 
prinjary  schools  throughout  France.  In 
the  second  he  proposed  the  establishment 
of  colleges  of  literature  in  each  depart- 
ment, with  a  National  Lycee  at  Paris  for  highej;  (university) 
education,  and  to  contain  the  essentials  of  a  national  normal 
school  or  teachers'  college  as  well. 

Mirabeau 's  proposals  represent  rather  a  traiisition  in  thinking 
from  the  old  to  the  new,  but  the  Report  of  Tallevrand  (1791), 
former  Bishop  of  Autun,  now  turned  revolutionist,  embodies  the 
full  culmination  of  revolutionary  educational  thought.     Pub- 


FiG.  63. 

Count  de  Mirabeau 
(1749-91) 


28o       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


Fig.  64.  Talleyrand 
(1758-1838) 


lie  instruction  he  termed  "a  power  which  embraces  everything, 
from  the  games  of  infancy  to  the  most  imposing  fetes  of  the 
Nation."  He  definitely  proposed  the  organization  of  a  complete 
state  system  of  pubHc  instruction  for 
France,  to  consist  of  a  primary  school  in 
every  canton  (community,  district),  open 
to  the  children  of  peasants  and  workmen 
—  classes  heretofore  unprovided  with  edu- 
cation ;  a  secondary  school  in  every  depart- 
ment (county) ;  a  series  of  special  schools 
in  the  chief  French  cities,  to  prepare  for 
the  professions;  and  a  National  Institute, 
or  University,  to  be  located  at  Paris.  In- 
spired by  Montesquieu's  principle  that 
"the  laws  of  education  ought  to  be  rela- 
tive to  the  principles  of  government," 
Talleyrand  proposed  a  bill  designed  to 
give  effect  to  the  provisions  of  the  Con- 
stitution of  1 79 1  relating  to  education,  and  to  provide  an 
education  for  the  people  of  France  who  were  now  to  exercise^ 
through  elected  representatives,  the  legislative  power  for  France. 
Instruction  he  held  to  be  the  necessary  counterpoise  of  liberty, 
and  every  citizen  was  to  be  taught  to  know,  obey,  love,  and 
protect  the  new  constitution.  Political,  social,  and  personal 
morality  were  to  take  the  place  of  religion  in  the  cantonal^ 
schools,  which  were  to  be  free  and  equally  open  to  all.  As  the 
Constituent  Assembly  was  succeeded  by  the  newly  elected  Legis- 
lative Assembly  within  three  weeks  after  Talleyrand  submitted 
his  Report,  no  action  was  taken  on  his  bill. 

2.  The  Legislative  Assembly  (October  i,  1791,  to  September  21, 
1792).  This  new  legislative  body  was  far  more  radical  in  char- 
acter than  its  predecessor,  and  far  more  radical  than  was  the 
sejitiment  of  France  at  the  time.  Among  other  acts  it  abol- 
ished (1792)  the  old  universities  and  confiscated  (1793)  their 
property  to  the  State.  To  it  was  submitted  (April  20-21,  1792) 
by  the  mathematician,  philosopher,  and  revolutionist,  Marquis 
de  Condorcet,  on  behalf  of  the  Committee  on  PubHc  Instruction 
and  as  a  measure  of  reconstruction,  a  Report  and  draft  of  a  Law 
for  the  organization  of  a  complete  democratic  system  of  public 
instruction  for  France  (R.  256).  It  provided  for  the  organizing 
of  a  primary  school  for  every  four  hundred  inhabitants,  in  which 


BEGINNINGS  OF  NATIONAL  EDUCATION    281 


Fig.  65.  CoNDORCET 

(1743-94) 


each  individual  was  "to  be  taught  to  direct  his  own  conduct 
and  to  enjoy  the  plentitude  of  his  own  rights,"  and  where 
principles  would  be  taught,  calculated  to 
''insure  the  perpetuation  of  liberty  and 
equality."  The  bill  also  provided,  for  the 
first  time,  for  the  organization  of  higher 
primary  schools  in  the  principal  towns; 
colleges  (secondary  schools)  in  the  chief 
cities  (one  for  every  four  thousand  inhab- 
itants); a  higher  school  for  each  ''depart- 
ment"; Lycees,  or  institutions  of  still 
higher  learning,  at  nine  places  in  France; 
and  a  National  Society  of  Sciences  and 
Arts  to  crown  the  educational  system  at 
Payis.  The  national  system  of  education  he 
proposed  was  to  be  equally  open  to  women,  as  well  as  men,  and 
to  be  gratuitous  throughout.    Teachers  for  each  grade  of  school 

were  to  be  prepared  in 
the  school  next  above. 
Sunday  lectures  for 
workingmen  and  peas- 
ants were  to  be  given 
by  teachers  everywhere. 
Public  morality,  politi- 
cal intelligence,  human 
progress,  and  the  pres- 
ervation of  Uberty  and 
equality  were  the  aims 
of  the  instruction.  The 
necessity  for  education 
in  a  constitutional  gov- 
ernment he  saw  clearly. 
"A  free  constitution," 
he  writes,  "which  should 
not  be  correspondent  to 
the  universal  instruction 
of  citizens,  would  come 
to  destruction  after  a 
few  conflicts,  and  would  degenerate  into  one  of  those  forms  of 
government  which  cannot  preserve  the  peace  among  an  ignor- 
ant and  corrupt  people."    Anarchy  or  despotism  he  held  to  be 


Fig.  66.  The  Institute  of  France 

Founded  by  Article  298  of  the  Constitution  of 

Year  III  (1793) 


282        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

the  future  for  peoples  who  become  free  without  being  enlight- 
ened. The  bill  proposed  by  Condorcet,  while  too  ambitious  for 
the  France  of  his  day,  was  thoroughly  sound  as  a  democratic 
theory  of  education,  and  an  accurate  prediction  of  what  the 
nineteenth  century  brought  generally  into  existence.  Condorcet's 
Report  was  discussed,  but  not  acted  upon. 

3.  The  National  Convention  (September  21,  1792,  to  October 
26,  1795).  The  Convention  was  also  a  radical  body,  deeply  in- 
terested in  the  creation  of  a  system  of  state  schools  for  the  people 
of  France.  To  higher  education  there  was  for  a  time  marked  oppo- 
sition,  though  later  in  its  history  the  Convention  erected  a  number 
of  important  higher  technical  institutions  and  schools,  among 
the  most  important  of  which  was  the  Institute  of  France.  There 
was  also  in  the  Coij^ention  marked  opposition  to  all  forms  of 
clerical  control  of  schools.  The  schools  of  the  Brothers  of  the 
Christian  Schools  were  suppressed  by  it,  in  1792,  and  all  secular 
and  endowed  schools  and  colleges  were  abolished  and  their  prop- 
erty confiscated,  in  1 793 ,  The  complete  supremacy  of  the  State  in 
all  educational  matters  was  now  asserted.  Great  enthusiasm  was 
manifested  for  the  organization  of  state  primary  schools,  which 
were  ordered  estabUshed  in  1793  (R.  258  a),  and  in  these: 

Children  of  all  classes  were  to  receive  that  first  education,  physical, 
moral,  and  intellectual,  the  best  adapted  to  develop  in  them  republican 
manners,  patriotism,  and  the  love  of  labor,  and  to  render  them  worthy 
of  liberty  and  equality. 

The  course  of  instoiction  was  to  include:  "to  speak,  read,  and  write 
correctly  the  French  language;  the  geography  of  France;  the  rights  and 
duties  of  men  and  citizens;  the  first  notions  of  natural  and  familiar 
objects;  the  use  of  numbers,  the  compass,  the  level,  the  system  of 
weights  and  measures,  the  mechanical  powers,  and  the  measurement  of 
time.  They  are  to  be  taken  into  the  fields  and  the  workshops  where 
they  may  see  agricultural  and  mechanical  operations  going  on,  and 
take  part  in  the  same  so  far  as  their  age  will  allow." 

What  a  change  from  the  course  of  instruction  in  the  religious 
schools  just  preceding  this  period! 

A  multiplicity  of  reports,  bills,  and  decrees,  often  more  or  less 
contrg.dic.tory  but  still  embodying  ideas  advanced  by  Condorcet 
and  Talleyrand,  now  appeared .  Whereas  the  preceding  legislative 
bodies  had  considered  the  subject  carefully,  but  without  taking 
action,  the  Convention  now  acted.  The  nation,  though,  was  so 
engrossed  by  the  internal  chaos  and  foreign  aggression  that  there 
was  neither  time  nor  funds  to  carry  the  decrees  into  effect. 


BEGINNINGS  OF  NATIONAL  EDUCATION     283 

The  most  extreme  propKJsal  of  the  period  was  the  bill  of  Lepelle- 
tier  le  Saint-Fargeau  to  create  a  national  system  of  education 
modeled  closely  after  that  of  ancient  Sparta.  The  best  of  the  pro- 
posals probably  was  the  Lakanal  Law,  of  November  17,  1794, 
which  ordered  a  school  for  every  one  thousand  inhabitants,  with 
special  divisions  for  boys  and  girls,  and  which  provided  for  in- 
struction in: 

A  I.  Reading  and  writing  the  French  language. 

y^    2.  The  Declaration  of  the  Rights  of  Man,  and  the  Constitution. 

y^    3.  Lessons  on  republican  morals. 

4.  The  rules  of  simple  calculation  and  surveying. 

5.  Lessons  in  geography  and  the  phenomena  of  natiu^e. 

6.  Lessons  on  heroic  actions,  and  songs  of  triumph. 

The  law  of  October  25,  1795,  closed  the  work  of  the  Conven- 
tion. This  made  less  important  provisions  for  primary  education 
(R.  258  b)  than  had  preceding  bills,  but 
was  the  only  permanent  contribution  of 
this  period  to  the  organization  of  primary 
schools.  It  placed  greater  emphasis  than 
had  the  legislative  Assembly  on  the  crea- 
tion of  secondary  and  higher  institutions 
(R.  258  a),  of  more  value  to  the  bourgeois 
class.  This  bill  of  1795  represents  a  rea,c- 
twn  from  the  extreme  republican  ideas  of 
a  few  years  earlier,  and  the  triumph  of  the  ^ 
conservative  middle-class  elements  in  the  ^^-"^^"^^^  ^'7 
nation  over  the   radical   republican   ele-  /''  ' 

ments  previously  in  control.  ■^^^(^762^1^^ 

The  Convention  also,  in  the  latter  part 
of  its  history,  created  a  number  of  higher  technical  institutions 
of  importance,  which  were  expressive  alike  of  the  French  inter- 
est in  scientific  subjects  which  arose  during  the  latter  part  of 
the  eighteenth  century,  and  of  the  new  French  military  needs. 
Many  of  these  institutions  have  persisted  to  the  present,  so  well 
have  they  answered  the  scientific  interests  and  needs  of  the  na- 
tion. A  mere  list  of  the  institutions  created  is  all  that  need  be 
given.     These  were: 

/  Museum  or  Conservatory  of  Arts  (Jan.  16,  1794)- 

K  Conservatory  of  Arts  and  Trades  (Oct.  10,  1794). 

r   New  medical  schools  {Schools  of  Health)  ordered  (Dec.  4,  i794)- 

V^  Museum  of  Natural  History  (Dec.  11,  1794)- 


284       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

Central  Schools  to  succeed  the  former  Colleges  (secondary  schools) 

(Feb.  25,1795). 
School  of  Living  Oriental  Languages  (March  30,  1795). 
-^  Veterinary  Schools  (April  21,  1795). 
^  Course  in  Archaeology,  National  Library  (June  8,  1795). 
Bureau  of  Longitude  (June  29,  1795). 
Conservatory  of  Music  (Aug.  3,  1795). 
The  National  Library  (Oct.  17,  1795). 
Museum  of  Archaeological  Monuments  (Oct.  20,  1795). 
Polytechnic  Schools  (R.  257);  School  of  Civil  Engineering;  School  of 

Hydrographic  Engineers;  and  School  of  Mining  (Oct.  22,  1795). 

The  Convention  also  adopted  the  metric  system  of  weights  and 
measures;  enacted  laws  under  which  the  peasants  could  acquire 
title  to  the  lands  they  had  tilled  for  so  long;  and  began  the  unifica:: 
tiqn  of  the  laws  of  the  different  parts  of  the  country  into  a  single 
set,  which  later  culminated  in  the  Code  Napoleon. 

4.  The  Directory  (1795-99)  and  the  Consulate  (i 799-1804). 
The  Revolution  had  by  this  time  largely  spent  itself,  the  Direc- 
tory followed,  and  in  1799  Napoleon  became  First  Consul  and  for 
the  next  sixteen  years  was  master  of  France.  The  Law  of  1795 
for  primary  schools  (R.  258  b)  was  but  feebly  administered  under 
the  Directory,  as  foreign  wars  absorbed  the  energies  and  re- 
sources of  the  Government.  Napoleon's  chief  educational  inte> 
est,  too,  was  in  opening  up  opportunities  for  talent  to  rise,  in  en- 
couraging scientific  work  and  higher  specialized  institutions,  and 
in  developing  schools  of  a  type  that  would  support  the  kind  of 
government  he  had  imposed  upon  France.  The  secondary  and 
higher  schools  he  established  and  promoted  cost  him  money  at  a 
time  when  money  was  badly  needed  for  national  defense,  and 
primary  education  was  accordingly  neglected  during  the  time  he 

S.     directed  the  destinies  of  the  nation. 

~7P  The  Revolutionary  enthusiasts  had  stated  clearly  their  theory 
of  republican  education,  but  had  failed  to  establish  a  permanent 
state  school  system  according  to  their  plans.  This  now  became 
the  work  of  the  nineteenth  century.  In  the  meantime,  in  the  new 
United  States  of  America  the  same  ideas  were  taking  shape  and 
fiijding  expression,  and  to  the  developments  there  we  next  turn. 

^'^  III.  THE  NEW  STATE  THEORY  IN  AMERICA 

Waning  of  the  old  religious  interest.  As  early  as  1647  Rhode 
Island  Colony  had  enacted  the  first  law  providing  for  freedom  of 
religious  worship  ever  enacted  by  an  English-speaking  people, 


BEGINNINGS  OF  NATIONAL  EDUCATION     285 

and  two  years  later  Maryland  enacted  a  similar  law.  Though  the 
Maryland  law  was  later  repealed,  and  a  rigid  Church-of-England 
rule  established  there,  these  laws  were  indicative  of  the  new  spirit 
arising  in  the  New  World.  By  the  beginning  of  the  eighteenth 
century  a  change  in  attitude  toward  the  old  problem  of  personal 
salva^n  had  become  evident.  Frontier  conditions;  the  gradual 
rise  of  a  civil  as  opposed  to  a  religious  form  of  town  government; 
the  ri^ng  interests  in  trade  and  shipping;  the  beginnings  of  the 
breakdown  of  the  old  aristocratic  traditions  and  customs  trans- 
plaiited  from  Europe;  the  rising  individualism  in  both  Europe 
and  America  —  these  all  helped  to  weaken  the  hold  on  the  people 
of  the  old  religious  doctrines. 

By  I2SO  the  change  in  religious  thinking  in  the  Arngrican  Colo- 
nies  had  become  quite  marked.  The  day  of  the  monopoly  of  any 
sect  in  a  Colony  was  ^er.  New  secular  interests  began  to  take 
the  place  of  religion  as  the  chief  topic  of  thought  and  conversation, 
and  secular  books  began  to  dispute  the  earlierpredominance  of  the 
Bible.  A  few  colonial  newspapers  had  begun  (seven  by  1750), 
and  these  became  expressive  of  the  new  colony  interests. 

Changing  character  of  the  schools.  These  changes  in  attitude 
toward  the  old  religious  problems  materially  affected  both  the 
support  and  the  character  of  the  education  provided  in  the  Colo- 
nies. The  Law  of  1647,  requiring  the  maintenance  of  the  Latin 
grammar  schools,  had  been  found  to  be  increasingly  difficult  of 
enforcement,  not  only  in  Massachusetts,  but  in  all  the  other  New 
England  Colonies  which  had  followed  the  Massachusetts  exam- 
ple. With  the  changing  attitude  of  the  people,  which  had  become 
clearly  manifest  by  1750,  the  demand  for  relief  from  the  mainte- 
nance of  this  school  in  favor  of  a  more  practical  and  less  aristo- 
cratic type  of  higher  school,  if  higher  school  were  needed  at  all, 
became  marked.  By  the  close  of  the  colonial  period  the  new 
American  Academy  (p.  248),  with  its  more  practical  studies,  had 
begun  to  supersede  the  old  Latin  grammar  school. 

The  elementary  school  experienced  something  of  the  same  diffi- 
culties. Many  of  the  parochial  schools  died  out,  while  others  de- 
clined in  character  and  importance.  In  Church-of-England  C0I0-- 
nies  all  elementary  education  was  left  to  private  initiative  and 
philanthropic  and  reUgious  effort  (p.  241).  In  the  southern  Colo- 
nies the  classes  in  society  and  the  character  of  the  plantation  life 
made  common  schools  impossible,  and  the  feeling  of  any  need  for 
elementary  schools  almost  entirely  died  out.     In  New  England 


286        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

the  eighteenth  century  was  a  continual  struggle  on  the  one  hand 
to  prevent  the  original  religious  town  school  from  disappearing, 
and  on  the  other  to  estabUsh  in  its  place  a  series  of  scattered  and 
inferior  district  schools,  while  either  church  or  town  support  and 
tuition  fees  became  ever  harder  to  obtain.  Among  other  changes 
of  importance  the  reading  school  and  the  writing  school  now  be- 
came definitely  united,  in  all  the  smaller  places  and  in  the  rural 
districts,  as  a  measure  of  economy,  to  form  the  American  school' 
of  the  "3  Rs."  New  textbooks,  too,  containing  less  of  the  gloom- 
ily religious  than  the  New  England  Primer,  and  secular  rather 
than  religious  in  character  (p.  235),  appeared  after  1750  and  be- 
gan to  be  used  in  the  schools.  After  1750,  too,  it  was  increasingly 
evident  that  the  old  religious  enthusiasm  for  schools  had  largely 
died  out;  that  European  traditions  and  ways  and  types  of  schools 
no  longer  completely  satisfied;  and  that  the  period  of  the  trans- 
planting of  European  educational  ideas  and  schools  and  types  of 
instruction  was  coming  to  an  end.  Instead,  the  evolution  of  a 
public  or  state  school  out  of  the  original  religious  school,  and  the 
beginnings  of  the  evolution  of  distinctly  American  types  of 
schools,  better  adapted  to  American  needs,  became  increasingly 
evident  in  the  Colonies  as  the  eighteenth  century  progressed. 

When  our  national  government  and  the  different  state  gov- 
ernments were  established,  the  States  were  ready  to  accept,  in 
principle  at  least,  the  theory  gradually  worked  out  in  New  Eng- 
land that  schools  are  state  institutions,  and  should  be  under  the 
control  of  the  State. 

Many  of  the  older  States  enacted  general  state  school  laws 
early  in  their  history  (R.  262).  Connecticut  continued  the  gen- 
eral school  laws  of  1700,  171 2,  and  17 14  unchanged,  and  in  1795 
added  $1,200,000,  derived  from  land  sales,  to  a  permanent  state 
school  endowment  fund,  created  as  early  as  1750.  Vermont  en- 
acted a  general  school  law  in  1782.  Massachusetts  and  New 
Hampshire  enacted  new  general  school  laws,  in  1789,  which  re- 
stated and  legalized  the  school  development  of  the  preceding  hun- 
dred and  fifty  years.  All  these  required  the  maintenance  of 
schools  by  the  towns  for  a  definite  term  each  year,  ordered  taxa- 
tion, and  fixed  the  school  studies  required  by  the  State.  New 
York,  in  1787,  created  an  administrative  organization,  known  as 
the  University  of  the  State  of  New  York,  to  supervise  secondary 
and  higher  education  throughout  the  State  —  an  institution 
clearly  modeled  after  the  centraUzing  ideas  of  Condorcet,  Rol- 


BEGINNINGS  OF  NATIONAL  EDUCATION    287 

land,  and  Diderot  (p.  278),  and  very  similar  to  the  ideas  proposed 
by  Talleyrand  and  Condorcet  and  later  (1808)  embodied  in  the 
University  of  France  by  Napoleon.  In  1795  New  York  also  pro- 
vided for  a  state  system  of  elementary  education.  Georgia  cre- 
ated a  state  system  of  academies,  as  early  as  1783.  Delaware 
created  a  state  school  fund,  in  1796,  and  Virginia  enacted  an  op- 
tional school  law  the  same  year.  North  CaroUna  created  a  state 
university,  as  early  as  1795. 

The  new  political  motive  for  schools.  We  thus  see,  in  the  new 
United  States,  the  theories  of  the  French  revolutionary  thinkers 
and  statesmen  actually  being  real- 
ized in  practice.  The  constitutional 
provisions,  and  even  the  legislation, 
often  were  in  advance  of  what  the 
States,  impoverished  as  they  were 
by  the  War  of  Independence,  could 
at  once  carry  out,  but  they  mark 
the  evolution  in  America  of  a  clearly 
defined  state  theory  as  to  educa- 
tion, and  the  recognition  of  a  need 
for  general  education  in  a  govern- 
ment whose  actions  were  so  largely 

influenced  by  the  force  of  pubUc     ^       "I'Z^        t 

.  .  ^/   ^    ,      ,  ^        y    .  Fig.  68.  Thomas  Jefferson 

opmion.     The  Federal  Constitution  (1743-1826) 

had  extended  the  right  to  vote  for 

national  officers  to  all,  and  the  older  States  soon  began  to  remove 
their  earlier  property  qualifications  for  voting  and  to  extend  gen- 
eral manhood  suffrage  to  all  citizens. 

This  new  development  in  government  by  the  people,  which 
meant  the  passing  of  the  rule  of  a  propertied  and  educated  class 
and  the  establishment  of  a  real  democracy,  caused  the  leading 
American  statesmen  to  turn  early  to  general  education  as  a  neces- 
sity for  republican  safety.  In  his  Farewell  Address  to  the  Ameri- 
can people,  written  in  1796,  Washington  said: 

Promote,  then,  as  an  object  of  primary  importance,  institutions  for 
the  general  diffusion  of  knowledge.  In  proportion  as  the  structure  of 
a  government  gives  force  to  public  opinion,  it  is  essential  that  public 
opinion  should  be  enlightened. 

Jefferson  spent  the  years  1784  to  1789  in  Paris,  and  became 
a  great  propagandist  in  America  for  French  political  ideas. 


288        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

Writing  to  James  Madison  from  France,  as  early  as  1787,  he 
said: 

Above  all  things,  I  hope  the  education  of  the  common  people  will 
be  attended  to;  convinced  that  on  this  good  sense  we  may  rely  with  the 
most  security  for  the  preservation  of  a  due  sense  of  liberty. 

In  1799,  then,  as  a  member  of  the  Virginia  legislature,  Jefferson 
tried  unsuccessfully  to  secure  the  passage  of  a  comprehensive  bill 
(R.  263),  after  the  plan  of  the  French  Revolutionary  proposals, 
for  the  organization  of  a  complete  system  of  public  education  for 
Virginia. 

Though  the  scheme  failed  of  approval,  Jefferson  never  lost  in- 
terest in  the  education  of  the  people  for  intelligent  participation 
in  the  functions  of  government.  Writing  from  Monticello  to 
Colonel  Yancey,  ini8i6,  after  his  retirement  from  the  presidency, 
he  wrote: 

If  a  nation  expects  to  be  ignorant  and  free  in  a  state  of  civilization  it 
expects  what  never  was  and  never  will  be.  .  .  .  There  is  no  safe  deposit 
(for  the  functions  of  government)  but  with  the  people  themselves; 
nor  can  they  be  safe  with  them  without  information. 

In  1 819  the  founding  of  the  University  of  Virginia  crowned  Jef- 
ferson's efforts  for  education  by  the  State.  This  institution, 
the  Declaration  of  Independence,  and  the  statute  for  religious 
freedom  in  Virginia,  stand  to-day  as  the  three  enduring  monu- 
ments to  his  memory. 

Other  of  the  early  American  statesmen  expressed  similar  views 
as  to  the  importance  of  general  education  by  the  State. 

Having  founded,  as  Lincoln  so  well  said  later  at  Gettysburg, 
"on  this  continent  a  new  nation,  conceived  in  liberty,  and  dedi- 
cated to  the  proposition  that  aU  men  are  created  equal,"  and  hav- 
ing built  a  constitutional  form  of  government  based  on  that 
equality,  it  in  time  became  e\ddent  to  those  who  thought  at  all  on 
the  question  that  that  liberty  and  poHtical  equality  could  not  be 
preserved  without  the  general  education  of  all.  A  new  motive 
for  education  was  thus  created  and  gradually  formulated  in  the 
United  States,  as  well  as  in  revolutionary  France,  and  the  nature 
of  the  school  instruction  of  the  youth  of  the  State  came  in  time  to 
be  colored  through  and  through  by  this  new  poHtical  motive. 
The  necessary  schools,  though,  did  not  come  at  once.  On  the 
contrary,  the  struggle  to  establish  these  necessary  schools  it  will 
be  our  purpose  to  trace  in  subsequent  chapters,  but  before  doing 


BEGINNINGS  OF  NATIONAL  EDUCATION    289 

so  we  wish  first  to  point  out  how  the  rise  of  a  political  theory  for 
education  led  to  the  development  of  a  theory  as  to  the  nature 
of  the  educational  process  which  exercised  a  far-reaching  in- 
fluence on  all  subsequent  evolution  of  schools  and  teaching. 


QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

1.  What  do  the  proposals  of  La  Chalotais,  Rolland,  and  Turgot  indicate 
as  to  the  degree  of  xinification  of  France  attained  by  the  time  they  wrote? 

2.  What  new  subjects  did  Diderot  add  to  the  religious  elementary  school 
of  his  time? 

3.  Show  how  the  decline  in  efficiency  of  the  Jesuits  was  a  stimulating  force 
for  the  evolution  of  a  system  of  public  instruction  in  France. 

4.  Show  the  statesman-Uke  character  of  the  proposals  made  in  the  legisla- 
tive assemblies  of  France  for  the  organization  of  national  education. 

5.  Assuming  that  there  had  been  peace,  and  funds  to  carry  out  the  law 
(1793)  of  the  Convention  for  primary  instruction,  what  other  difficulties 
would  have  been  met  that  would  have  been  hard  to  surmount? 
Compare  the  Lakanal  school  with  an  American  elementary  school  of  a 
half-century  ago. 

Show  that  many  of  the  important  educational  reforms  of  Napoleon  were 
foreshadowed  in  the  National  Convention. 

8.  Was  Napoleon  right  in  his  attitude  toward  education  and  schools? 
g.  Explain  the  lack  of  success  of  the  revolutionary  theorists  in  the  estab- 
Hshment  of  a  state  system  of  education.  '• 

10.  Explain  why  the  breakdown  of  the  old  religious  intolerance  came  earlier 
in  the  American  Colonies  than  in  the  Old  World. 

11.  Show  the  great  value  of  the  Laws  of  1642  and  1647  in  holding  New  Eng- 
land true  to  the  maintenance  of  schools  during  the  period  of  decUne. 

12.  What  might  have  been  the  result  in  America  had  the  New  England  Colo- 
nies established  the  school  as  a  parish  institution,  as  did  the  central 
Colonies? 

13.  Analyze  the  Massachusetts  constitutional  provision  for  education,  and 
show  what  it  provided  for. 

14.  Show  the  similarity  of  the  University  of  the  State  of  New  York  to  the 
proposals  for  governmental  control  in  France. 

15.  Explain  why  the  French  revolutionary  ideas  as  to  education  were  realized 
so  easily  in  the  new  United  States,  whereas  France  did  not  realize  them 
until  well  into  the  nineteenth  century. 

16.  Compare  Jefferson's  proposed  law  with  the  proposals  of  Talleyrand  for 
France. 

17.  Just  what  type  of  educational  institutions  did  Washington  have  in  mind 
in  the  quotation  from  his  Farewell  Address?    John  Jay?    John  Adams? 

SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  selections  are  repro- 
duced: 

254.  Dabney:  The  Far-Reaching  Influence  of  Rousseau's  Writings. 

255.  La  Chalotais:  Essay  on  National  Education. 

256.  Condorcet:  Outline  of  a  Plan  for  Organizing  Public  Instruction  in 

France. 

257.  Report:  Founding  of  the  Polytechnic  School  at  Paris. 


290        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

258.  Barnard:  Work  of  the  National  Convention  in  France. 

(a)  Various  legislative  proposals. 

(b)  The  Law  of  1795  organizing  Primary  Instruction. 

259.  American  States:  Early  Constitutional  Provisions  relating  to  Edu- 

cation. 

260.  Ohio:  Educational  Provisions  of  First  Constitution. 

261.  Indiana:  Educational  Provisions  of  First  Constitution. 

262.  American  States:  Early  School  Legislation  in. 

263.  Jefferson:  Plan  for  Organizing  Education  in  Virginia. 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

Barnard,  Henry.    American  Journal  of  Education,  vol.  22,  pp.  651-64. 
Compayre,  G.     History  of  Pedagogy,  chapters  15,  16,  17, 
Cubberley,  E.  P.    Public  Education  in  the  United  Stales,  chapter  3. 


CHAPTER  XXI 

A  NEW  THEORY  AND  SUBJECT-MATTER  FOR  THE 
ELEMENTARY  SCHOOL 

In  chapters  xvii  and  xviii  we  traced  the  development  of  educa- 
tional theory  up  to  the  point  where  John  Locke  left  it  (p.  217) 
after  outlining  his  social  and  disciplinary  theory  for  the  educa- 
tional process,  and  in  the  chapter  preceding  this  one  we  traced  the 
evolution  of  a  new  state  theory  as  to  the  purpose  of  education  to 
replace  the  old  religious  theory.  The  new  theory  as  to  state  con- 
trol, and  the  erection  of  a  citizenship  purpose  for  education,  made 
it  both  possible  and  desirable  that  the  instruction  in  the  school, 
and  particularly  in  the  vernacular  school,  should  be  recast,  both  in 
method  and  content,  to  bring  the  school  into  harmony  with  the 
new  secular  purpose.  In  consequence,  an  important  reorgan- 
ization of  the  vernacular  school  now  took  place,  and  to  this 
transformation  of  the  elementary  school  we  next  turn. 

I.  THE  NEW  THEORY  STATED 

Iconoclastic  nature  of  the  work  of  Rousseau.    The  inspirer  of 
the  new  theory  as  to  the  purpose  of  education  was  none  other 
than  the  French-Swjss  iconoclast  and  political  writer,  Jean-Jacques 
Rousseau,  whose  work  as  a  poli^cal  theorist  we  have  previ- 
ousl^described.     Happening  to  take  up  the  educational  problem 
as  a  phase  of  his  activity  against  the  political  and  social  and 
j     ecclesiastical  conditions  of  his  age,  drawing  freely  on  Lockers 
(      Thoughts  for  ideas,  and  inspired  by  a  feeling  that  so  corrupt  and 
i     debased  was  his  age  that  if  he  rejected  everything  accepted  by  it 
^     and  adopted  the  opposite  he  would  reach  the  truth,  Rousseau  re- 
stated his  pohtical  theories  as  to  the  control  of  man  by  society 
and  his  ideas  as  to  a  life  according  to  "  nature  "  in  a  book  in  which 
1      he  described  the  education,  from  birth  to  manhood,  of  an  imagi- 
\     nary  boy,  Emile,  and  his  future  wife,  Sophie.    In  the  first  sentence 
\     of  the  book~lRousseau  sets  forth  his  fundamental  thesis: 

\         All  is  good  as  it  comes  from  the  hand  of  the  Creator;  all  degenerates 

^     under  the  hands  of  man.    He  forces  one  country  to  produce  the  frufts 

of  another,  one  tree~to  bear  that  of  another.    He  confounds  climates, 

elements,  and  s^agons;  he  mutilates  his  dog,  his  horse,  his  slave;  turns 


292       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

everything  topsy-turvy,  disfigures  everything.  He  will  have  nothing 
as  nature  made  it,  not  even  man  himself;  he  must  be  trained  like  a 
ni^oaged  horse;  trimmed  like  a  tree  in  a  garden. 

His  book,  published  in  1762,  in  no  sense  outlined  a  workable 
system  of  education.  Instead,  in  charming  literary  style,  with 
much  sophistry,  many  paradoxes,  numerous  irrelevant  digressions 

upon  topics  having  no  relation 
to  education,  and  in  no  system- 
atic order,  Rousseau  presented  his 
ideas  as  to  the  nature^^^and  purpose 
of  education.  Emphasizing  the 
importance  of  the  natural  devel- 
opment of  the  child  (R.  264  a), 
he  contended  that  the  three  great 
teachers  of  man  were  nature,  man^ 
and  experience,  and  that  the  sec- 
ond and  third  tended  to  destroy 
the  value  of  the  first  (R.  264  b) ; 
that  the  child  should  be  handled 
in  a  new  way,  and  that  the  most 
important  item  in  his  training  up 
to  twelve  years  of  age  was  to  do  nothing  (R.  264  c,  d)  so  that 
nature  might  develop  his  character  properly  (R.  264  e) ;  and  that 
from  twelve  to  fifteen  his  education  should  be  largely  from  things 
and  nature,  and  not  from  books  (R.  264  f).  As  the  outcome  of 
such  an  education  Rousseau  produced  a  boy  who,  from  his  point 
of  view,  would  at  eighteen  still  be  natural  (R.  264  g)  and  un^: 
spoiled  by  the  social  life  about  him,  which,  after  all,  he  felt  was 
soon  to  pass  away  (R.  264  i).  The  old  religious  instruction  he 
would  completely  supersede  (R.  264  h). 

So  depraved  was  the  age,  and  so  wretched  were  the  educational 
pragEces  of  his  time,  that,  in  spite  of  the  malevolent  impulse 
which  wasjus  driving  force,  what  he  wrote  actually  contained 
many^xcellent  ideas,  pointed  the  way  to  better  practices,  and  be- 
came  an  inspiration  for  others  who,  unlike  Rousseau,  were  deeply 
interested  in  problems  of  education  and  child  weliare.  One  can- 
not study  Rousseau's  writings  as  a  whole,  see  him  in  his  eight- 
eenth-century setting,  know  of  his  personal  life,  and  not  feelthat 
the  far-reaclung  reforms  produced  by  his  Emile  are  among  the 
strangest  facts  in  history, 

TEe^valuable  elements  in  Rousseau*s  work.    Amid  his  glitter- 


FiG.  69.  The  Rousseau 
Monument  at  Geneva 


NEW  THEORY  AND  SUBJECT-MATTER    293 

ing  generalities  and  striking  paradoxes  Rousseau  did,  however, 
set  forth  certain  important  ideas  as  to  the  proper  education  of 
children.  Popularizing  the^bnest  ideas  of  the  Englishman,  Locke 
(p.  217),  RousseaunmyKesaiH'ToTi^^  certain 

conceptions  as  to  the  education  of  children  which,  in  the  hands  of 
others,  brought  about  great  educational  changes.  Briefly  stated, 
these  were: 

1.  The  replacement  of  authority  by  reason  and  investigation. 

2.  That  education  should  be  adapted  to  the  gradually  unfolding 
capacities  of  the  child. 

3.  That  each  age  in  the  life  of  a  chM  has  activities  which  are  normal 
to  that  age,  and  that  education^hould  seek  for  and  follow  these. 

4.  That  physical  activity  and  health  are  of  first  importance. 

5.  That  education,  anTespecially  elementary  education,  should  take 
place  through  the  senses,  rather  thaiTthrough  the  niemory. 

6.  That  the  emphasis  placed  on  the  memory  in  education  is  funda- 
mentally wrong,  dwarfing  the  judgment  and  reason  of  the  child. 

7.  That  catechetical  and  Jesuitical  types  of  education  should  be 
abandoneH7 

8.  That  the  study  of  theological  subtleties  is  unsuited  to  child  needs 
or  child  capacity. 

9.  That  the  natural  interests,  curiosity,  and  activities  of  children 
should  be  utilised  in  their  education. 

10.  That  the  normal  activities  of  children  call  for  expression,  and  that 
the  best  means  of  utilizing  these  activities  are  conversation, 
writing,  drawing,  music,  and  play. 

11.  That  education  should  no  longer  be  exclusively  Uterary  and  lin^^ 
guistic,  but  should  be  based  on  sense  perception,  expression,  and 
reasoning. 

12.  That  such  education  calls  for  instruction  in  the  book  of  nature, 
with  home  geography  and  the  investigation  of  elementary  prob- 
lems in  science  occupying  a  prominent  place. 

13.  That  the  child,  be  taught  rather  than  the  subject-matter;  life 
here  rather  than  hereafter;  and  the  development  of  reason  rather 
than  the  loading  of  the  memory,  were  the  proper  objects  of  edu- 
cation. 

14.  Tliat  a  many-sided  education  is  necessary  to  reveal  child  possi- 
bihties;  to  correct  the  narrowing  effect  of  specialized  class  educa- 
tion; and  to  prepare  one  for  possible  changes  in  fortune. 

Coming,  as  it  did,  at  a  time  when  political  and  ecclesiastical 
despotisms  were  fast  breaking  down  in  France,  when  new  forces 
were  striving  for  expression  throughout  Europe,  and  when  new 
theories  as  to  the  functions  of  government  were  being  set  forth  in 
the  American  Colonies  and  in  France,  it  gave  the  needed  inspira- 
tion for  the  evolution  of  a  new  theor}^  of  non-religious,  universal, 
and  democratic  education  which  would  prepare  citizens  for  intelli- 


^"^     294       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

gent  participation  in  the  functions  of  a  democratic  State,  and  for 
a  reorganization  of  the  subject-matter  of  education  itself. 

II.  GERMAN  ATTEMPTS  TO  WORK  OUT  A  NEW  THEORY 

Influence  of  the  Emile  in  German  lands.  The  Emile  was 
widely  read,  not  only  in  France,  but  throughout  the  continent  of 
Europe  as  well.  In  German  lands  its  publication  coincided  with 
the  rising  tide  of  nationahsm  —  the  "Period  of  Enlightenment " 
—  and  the  book  was  warmly  welcomed  by  such  (then  young) 
men  as  Goethe,  Schiller,  Herder,  Richter,  Fichte,  and  Kant.  It 
presented  a  new  ideal  of  education  and  a  new  ideal  for  humanity, 
and  its  ideas  harmonized  well  with  those  of  the  newly  created 
aristocracy  of  worth  which  the  young  German  enthusiasts  were 
busily  engaged  in  proclaiming  for  their  native  land. 

Perhaps  the  most  important  practical  influence  exerted  by  the 
Emile  in  German  lands  came  in  the  work  of  Johann  Bernard 
Basedow  and  his  followers.  Deeply  imbued  with  the  new  scien- 
tific spirit,  in  thorough  revolt  against  the  dominance  of  the 
Church  in  human  lives,  and  incited  to  new  efforts  by  his  reading 

of  the  Emile,  Basedow  thought  out 
a  plan  for  a  reform    school  which 
should  put  many  of  Rousseau's  ideas 
into  practice.    In  1768  he  issued  his 
Address  to  Philanthropists  and  Men  of 
Property  on  Schools  and  Studies  and 
their  Influence  on  the  Public  Weal,  in 
which  he  appealed  for  funds  to  enable 
him  to  open  a  school  to  try  out  his 
ideas,  and  to  enable  him  to  prepare 
a  new  type  of  textbooks  for  the  use  of 
schools.     He  proposed  in  this  appeal 
to  organize  a  school  which  should  be 
non-sectarian,    and   also   advocated 
the  creation  of  a  National  Council  of  Education  to  have  charge 
of  all  public  instruction.     These  were  essentially  the  ideas  of  the 
'O    French  politic^,!  reformers  of  the  time.    The  appeal  was  widely 
I   scattered,  awakened  much  enthusiasm,  and  subscriptions  to  assist 
'  ^  him  poured  in  from  many  sources. 

In  1774  Basedow  published  two  works  of  more  than  ordinary 
importance.  The  first,  a  Book  of  Method  for  Fathers  and  Mothers 
of  Families  and  of  Nations,  was  a  book  for  adults,  and  outlined  a 


Fig.  70.  Basedow 
(1723-90) 


NEW  THEORY  AND  SUBJECT-MATTER    295 

plan  of  education  for  both  boys  and  girls.  C^he  keynotes  were 
''following  nature,"  "impartial  religious  instruction,"  children  to 
be  dealt  with  as  children,  learning  through  the  senses,  language 
instruction  by  a  natural  method,  and  much  study  of  natural  ol> 
jects^>  The  ideas  were  a  combination  of  those  of  Bacon,  Come- 
jlius,  and  Rousseau.  The  second  book,  in  four  volumes,  and  con- 
taining one  hundred  copper-plate  illustrations,  was  the  famous 
Elementary  Work  (Elementarwerk  mil  Kupfern)  (R.  266),  the 
first  illustrated  school  textbook  since  the  Orbis  Pictus  (1654)  of 
Comenius.  This  work  of  Basedow's  became,  in  German  lands, 
the  Orhis  Pictus  of  the  eighteenth  century.  By  means  of  its 
"natural  method.s"  (R.  265)  children  were  to  be  taught  to  read, 
both  the  vernacular  and  Latin,  more  easily  and  in  less  time  than 
had  been  done  before,  and  in  addition  were  to  be  given  a  knowl- 
edge of  morals,  commerce,  scientific  subjects,  and  social  usages  by 
"an  incomparable  method,"  founded  on  experience  in  teaching 
children.  The  book  enjoyed  a  wide  circulation  among  the  middle 
and  upper  classes  in  German  lands. 

Basedow's  Philanthropinum.  In  1774  Prince  Leopold,  of  Des- 
sau, a  town  in  the  duchy  of  Anhalt,  in  northern  Germany,  gave 
Basedow  the  use  of  two  buildings  and  a  garden,  and  twelve  thou- 
sand thalers  in  money,  with  which  to  establish  his  long-heralded 
Philanthropinum,  which  was  to  be  an  educational  institution  of  a 
new  type.  Great  expectations  were  aroused,  and  a  widespread 
interest  in  the  new  school  awakened.  (^  Education  according  to  na- 
ture, with  a  reformed,  time-saving,  natural  method  for  the  teach- 
ing of  languages,  were  to  be  its  central  ideas.  Children  were  to 
be  treated  as  children,  and  not  as  adults.  Powdered  hair,  gilded 
coats,  swords,  rouge,  and  hoops  were  to  be  discarded  for  short 
hair,  clean  faces,  sailor  jackets,  and  caps,  while  the  natural  plays 
of  children  and  directed  physical  training  were  to  be  made  a  fea- 
ture of  the  instruction.  [  The  languages  were  to  be  taught  by  con- 
versational methods.  Each  child  was  to  be  taught  a  handicraft 
—  turning,  planing,  and  carpentering  were  provided  —  for  both 
social  and  educational  reasons.  Instruction  in  real  things  — 
science,  nature  —  was  to  take  the  place  of  instruction  in  words, 
and  the  vernacular  was  to  be  the  language  of  instruction.  The 
institution  was  to  have  the  atmosphere  of  religion,  but  was  not 
to  be  CathoUc,  Lutheran,  Reformed,  or  Jewish,  and  was  to  be 
free  from  "theologizing  distinctions."  Latin,  German,  French, 
mathematics,  a  knowledge  of  nature  (geography,  physics,  natural 


296        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

history),  music,  dancing,  drawing,  and  physical  training  were  the 
principal  subjects  of  instruction.  (The  children  were  divided  into 
four  classes,  and  the  instruction  for  each,  with  the  textbooks  to  be 
used,  was  outlined  (R.  265)>| 

As  a  promising  experiment  the  school  awakened  widespread 
interest,  and  Basedow  was  supported  by  such  thinkers  of  the 
time  as  Goethe  and  Kant. 

Basedow's  influence,  and  followers.  Basedow,  though,  was  an 
impractical  theorist,  boastful  and  quarrelsome,  vulgar  and  coarse, 
given  to  drunkenness  and  intemperate  speech,  and  fond  of  making 
claims  for  his  work  which  the  results  did  not  justify.  In  a  few 
years  he  had  been  displaced  as  director,  and  in  i^ygj  the  Philan- 
thropinum  closed  its  doors.  The  school,  nevertheless,  was  a  very 
important  educational  experiment,  and  Basedow's  work  for  a 
time  exerted  a  profound  influence  on  German  pedagogical  thought. 
He  may  be  said  to  have  raised  instruction  in  the  Realien  in 
German  lands  to  a  place  of  distinct  importance,  and  to  have 
given  a  turn  to  such  instruction  which  it  has  ever  since  retained. 
The  methods  of  instruction,  too,  worked  out  in  arithmetic,  geog- 
raphy, geometry,  natural  history,  physics,  and  history  were  in 
many  ways  as  revolutionary  as  those  evolved  by  Pestalozzi  later 
on  in  Switzerland.  In  his  emphasis  on  scientific  subject-matteF) 
Basedow  surpassed  Pestalozzi,  but  Pestalozzi  possessed  a  clearer, 
intuitive  insight  into  the  nature  and  purpose  of  the  educational 
process.  The  work  of  the  two  men  furnishes  an  interesting  basis 
for  comparison  (R.  271),  and  the  work  of  each  gave  added  impor- 
tance to  that  of  the  other. 

From  Dessau  an  interest  in  pedagogical  ideas  and  experiments 
spread  over  Europe,  and  particularly  over  German  lands.  Other 
institutions,  modeled  after  the  Philanthropinum,  were  founded  in 
many  places,  and  some  of  Basedow^s  followers  did  as  important 
work  along  certain  lines  as  did  Basedow  himself.  His  followers 
were  ni^nerous,  and  of  all  degrees  of  worth.  They  urged  accept- 
ance of  the  new  ideas  of  Rousseail  as  worked  out  and  promulgated 
by  Basedow:  vigorously  attacked  ~the  old  schools,  making  con- 
verts here-a^d  there;  and  in  a  way  helj)ed  to  prepare  northern 
German  lands  for  the  incoming,  later,  of  the  better-organized 
ideas  of  the  German-Swiss  reformer  Pestalozzi,  to -whose  work  we 
next  turn. 


NEW  THEORY  AND  SUBJECT-xMATTER     297 

^^^f^^Wl.  THE  WORK  AND  INFLUENCE  OF  PESTALOZZI 

The  inspiration  of  Pestalozzi.  Among  those  most  deeply  in- 
fluenced by  Rousseau's  Entile  was  a  young  German-Swiss  by  the 
name  of  Johann  Heinrich  Pestalozzi,  who  was  bom  (1746)  and 
brought  up  in  the  ancient  city  of  Zurich.  Inspired  by  Rousseau's 
writings  he  spent  the  e^rly^part  of  his  life  in  trying  to  render  serv- 
ice to  the  poor,  and  the  latter  part  in  working  out  for  himself  a 
theory  and  a  method  of  instrucJJQa  based  on  thejiatural  develop-^ 
ment  of  the  child.  To  Pestalozzi,  more  than  to  any  one  else,  we 
owe  the  foundations  of  the  modern  secular  vernacular  elementary 
school,  and  iu  coujequeiicg^his  wolrFis  of  commanding  importance 
in  the  history  of  tEedevelopment  of  educational  practice. 

ll^'ing  to  educate  his  own  child  according  to  Rousseau's  plan, 
he  not  only  discovered  its  impracticability  but  also  that  the  only 
way  to  improve  on  it  was  to  study  the  children  themselves.  Ac- 
cordingly he  opened  a  school  and  home  on  his  farm  at  Neuhof, 
in  1774.  Here  he  took  in  fdty  abandoned  children,  to  whom 
he  taught  reading,  writing,  and  arithmetic,  gave  thenLJUQial 
discourses,  and  trained  them  in  gardening,  farming,  and  cheese- 
rnakiHg^  It  was  an  attempt^to  regenerate  beggars  by  means  of 
education,  which  Pestalozzi  firmly  believed  could  be  done.  At 
the  end  of  two  years  he  had  spent  all  the  money  he  and  his  wife 
possessed,  and  the  school  closed  in  failure  —  a  blessing  in  dis- 
guise —  though  with  Pestalozzi's  faith  in  the  power  of  education 
unshaken.  Of  this  exp>eriment  he  wrote:  "  For  years  I  havejived 
in  the  midst  of  fifty  little  beggars,  sharing' in  my  poverty  my 
bread  with  them,  living  like  a  b^gsa^myselfmT  order  to~Ieach 
beggars  to  live  like^en.'^ 

Turning  next  to  writing,  while  continuing  to  farm,  Pestalozzi 
now  tried  to  express  his  faith  in  education  in  printed  form.  His 
Leonard  and  Gertrude  (1781)  was  a  wonderfully  beautiful  stor\*  of 
Swiss  peasant  life,  and  of  the  genius  and  syinpathy  and  love  of  a 
woman  amid  degrading  surroundings.  From  a  wretched  place 
the  village  of  Bonnal,  under  Pestalozzi's  p>en,  was  transformed  by 
the  power  of  education.  The  book  was  a  great  success  from  the 
first,  and  for  it  Pestalozzi  was  made  a  ''citizen"  of  the  French 
Republic.  He  continued  to  farm  and  to  think,  though  nearly 
starving,  until  1V98,  when  the  opportunity  for  which  he  was  really 
fitted  came. 
*T*estaloz7i's  educational  experiments.    In  1798  "The  Helvetic 


298        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

Republic"  was  proclaimed,  an  event  which  divided  Pestalozxi's 
life  into  two  parts.  Up  to  this  time  he  had  been  interested  wholly 
in  the  philanthropic  aspect  of  education,  believing  that  the  poor 
could  be  regenerated  through  education  and  labor.     From  this 


SWITZERLAND 

Scale  of  Miles 
' ,l|i        i  ' 

0      19     ao 


PRAK  CE     . 


.^"\m 


PRANCE  '"K^.^  ^^^^^^^0£^  ^"^'*'^« 

V^^^^Pl   T  A   L   Y  C:» 


Fig.  71.  The  Scene  of  Pestalozzi's  Labors 


time  on  he  interested  himself  in  the  teaching  aspect  of  the  prob- 
lem, in  the  working-out  and  formulation  of  a  teaching  method 
based  on  the  natural  development  of  the  child,  and  in  training 
others  to  teach.  Much  to  the  disgust  of  the  authorities  of  the 
new  Swiss  Government,  citizen  Pestalozzi  applied  for  service  as 
a  schoolteacher.  The  opportunity  to  render  such  service  soon 
came. 

That  autumn  the  French  troops  invaded  Switzerland,  and,  in 
putting  down  the  stubborn  resistance  of  the  three  German  can-_ 
tons,  shot  down  a  large  number  of  the  people.  Orphans  to  the 
number  of  169  were  left  in  the  little  town  of  Stanz,  and  citizen 
Pestalozzi  was  given  charge  of  them.  For  six  months  he  was 
father,  mother,  teacher,  and  nurse.  Then,  worn  out  himself,  the 
orphanage  was  changed  into  a  hospital.  A  little  later  he  became 
a  schoolmaster  in  Burgdorf ;  was  dismissed;  became  a  teacher  in 
,  another  school;  and  finally,  in  1800,  opened  a  school  himself  in  an 
old  castle  there.  He  now  drew  about  him  other  teachers  inter- 
ested in  improving  instruction,  and  in  consequence  could  special- 


NEW  THEORY  AND  SUBJECT-MATTER     299 

ize  the  work.  He  provided  separate  teachers  for  drawing  and 
siijging,  geography  and  history,  language  and  arithmetic,  and 
gymnastics.  The  year  following  the  school  was  enlarged  into  a 
teachers'  training-school,  the  govermnent  extending  him  aid  in  re- 
turn for  giving  Swiss  teachers  one  month  of  training  as  teachers 
in  his  school.  In  1803,  the  castle  being  needed  by  the  gov- 
ernment, Pestalozzi  moved  first  to  Munchenbuchsee,  near  Hof- 
wyl,  opening  his  Institute  temporarily  in  an  old  convent  there. 
For  a  few  months,  in  1804,  he  was  associated  with  Emanuel  von 
Fellenberg,  at  Hofwyl  (p.  303),  but  in  October,  1804,  he  moved 
to  Yverdon,  where  he  reestabhshed  the  Institute,  and  where  the 
next  twenty  years  of  his  life  were  spent  and  his  greatest  success 
achieved. 

The  contribution  of  Pestalozzi.  The  great  contribution  of 
Pestalozzi  lay  in  that,  following  the  lead  of  Rousseau,  he  rejecte;d 
the  reUgious  aim  and  the  teaching  of  mere  words  and  facts,  which 
had  characterized  all  elementary  education  up  to  near  the  close  of 
the  eighteenth  century,  and  tried  instead  to  reduce  the  educa- 
tional process  to  a  well-organized  routine,  based  on  the  natural 
and  orderly  development  of  the  instincts,  capacities,  and  powers 
of  the  growing  child.  Taking  Rousseau's  idea  of  a  return  to  na- 
ture, he  tried  to  apply  it  to  the  education  of  children.  This  led  to 
his  rejection  of  what  he  called  the  "empty  chattering  of  mere 
words  "  and  "  outward  show  "  in  the  instruction  in  reading  and  the 
catechisrn,  and  the  introduction  in  their  place  of  real  studies, 
based  oi£observation,  experimentation,  and  reasoningi  f^Sense 
impression";  became  his  watchword.  As  he  expressed  it,  he 
"tried  to" organize  and  psychologize  the  educational  proc^si^'  by 
hafmomzingitwith  the  natural  development  of  the  child  (R.  267). 
To  This  emi  he^retully  studied  children,  and  developed  his 
methods  experimentally  as  a  result  of  his  observation. 

The  development  of  man  he  believed  to  be  organic,  and  to  pro- 
ceed according  to  law.  It  was  the  work  of  the  teacher  to  discover 
these  laws  of  development  and  to  assist  nature  in  securing  "a 
natural,  symmetrical,  and  harmonious  development? "^of  all  the  1 
"facultie§;''  of  the  child.  Real  education  must  develop  the  child 
as  a  whole  —  mentally,  physi(fally,  morally  —  and  called  for  the 
traimng  of  the  head  and  the  hand  and  the  heart.  The  only  proper 
means  for  developing  the  powers  ol  the  child"  was  use,  and  hence 
education  must  guide  and  stimulate  self-activity,  be  based  on  in- 
tuition and  exercise,  and  the  sense  impressions  must  be  organized 


300        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

and  directed.  Education,  too,  if  it  is  to  follow  the  organic  devel- 
opment of  the  child,  must  observe  the  proper  progress  of  child  de- 
velopment and  be  graded,  so  that  each  step  of  the  process  shall 
grow  out  of  the  preceding  and  grow  into  the  following  stage.  To 
accomplish  these  ends  the  training  must  be  all-round  and  har- 
monious; much  liberty  must  be  allowed  the  child  in  learning;  edu- 
cation must  proceed  largely  by  doing  instead  of  by  words,  the 
method  of  learning  must  be  largely  analytical;  real  objects  and 
ideas  must  precede  symbols  and  words;  and,  finally,  the  organiza- 
tion and  correlation  of  what  is  learned  must  be  looked  after  by  the 
teacher. 

Still  more,  Pestalozzi  possessed  a  deep  and  abiding  faith,  new  at 
the  time,  in  the  power  of  education  as  a  means  of  regenerating 
society.  He  had  begun  his  work  by  trying  to  "teach  beggars  to 
live  like  men,"  and  his  belief  in  the  potency  of  education  in  work- 
ing this  transformation,  so  touchingly  expressed  in  his  Leonard 
and  Gertrude,  never  left  him.  i  He  believed  that  each  human  being 
could  be  raised  through  the  influence  of  education  to  the. level  of 
an  intellectually  free  and  morally  independent  life,  and  that  every 
human  being  was  entitled  to  the  right  to  attain  such  freedom  and 
independence.  The  way  to  this  lay  through  the  full  use  of  his 
developing  powers,  under  the  guidance  of  a  teacher,  and  not 
through  a  process  of  repeating  words  and  learning  by  heart.  Not 
only  the  intellectual  qualities  of  perception,  judgment,  and  reason- 
ing need  exercise,  but  the  moral  powers  as  well.  To  provide*  such 
exercise  and  direction  was  the  work  of  the  school. 

The  consequences  of  these  ideas.  The  educational  conse- 
quences of  these  new  ideas  were  very  large.  They  in  time  gave 
aim  and  purpose  to  the  elementary  school  of  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury, transforming  it  from  an  instrument  of  the  Churclf  for  church 
ends,  to  an  instrument  of  society  to  be  used  for  its  own  regenera- 
tion and  the  advancement  of  the  welfare  of  all.  The  introduc- 
tion of  the  stiidy  of  natural  objects  in  place  of  words,  and  much 
talking  about  what  was  seen  and  studied  instead  of  parrot-like, 
reproductions  of  the  words  of  a  book,  revolutionized  both  the 
metiiO(;is  and  the  subject-matter  of  instruction  in  the  developing 
elementary  school.  Observation  and  investigation  tended  to 
supersede  mere  memorizing;  class  discussion  and  thinking  to  su- 
persede the  reciting  of  the  words  of  the  book;  thinking  about 
what  was  being  done  to  supersede  routine  learning;  and  class. in- 
struction to  supersede  the  wasteful  individual  teaching  which  had 


Plate  4,  Pestalozzi  Monument  at  Yverdon 

A  picture  of  this  monument  occupies  a  prominent  place  in  every 
schoolroom  in  Switzerland. 


NEW  THEORY  AND  SUBJECT-MATTER    301 

for  so  long  characterized  all  school  work.  It  meant  the  reorgani- 
zation of  the  work  of  the  vernacular  school  on  a  modem  basis, 
with  class  organization  and  group  instruction,  and  a  modem- 
world  purpose  (R.  269). 

The  work  of  Pestalozzi  also  meant  the  introduction  of  new 
subject-matter  for  instruction,  the  organization  of  new  teaching 
subjects  for  the  elementary  school,  and  the  redirection  of  the  el- 
ementary education  of  children.  Observation  led  to  the  devel- 
opment of  elementary-science  study,  and  the  study  of  home 
geography;  talking  about  what  was  observed,  led  to  the  study  of 
language  usage,  as  distinct  from  the  older  study  of  grammar;  and 
counting  and  measuring  led  to  the  study  of  number,  and  hence  to 
a  new  type  of  primary  arithmetic.  The  reading  of  the  school  also 
changed  both  in  character  and  purpose.  In  other  words,  in  place 
of  an  elementary  education  based  on  reading,  a  littie  writing  and 
spelling,  and  the  catechism,  all  of  a  memoriter  type  and  with  re- 
ligious ends  in  view,  a  new  primary  school,  essentially  secular  in 
character,  was  created  by  the  work  of  Pestalozzi."~Vrhis  new 
school  was  based  on  the  study  of  real  objects,  learning  through 
sense  impressions,  the  individual  expression  of  ideas,  child  activ- 
ity, and  the  developmeiit  of  the  child's  powers  in  an  orderly  way^ 
In  fact(  "the  development  of  the  faculties '^ of  the  child  became  a 
by-woro^vith  Pestalozzi  and  his  followers. 

me  spread  and  influence  of  Pestalozzi^s  work.  So  famous  did 
the  work  of  Pestalozzi  become  that  his  schools  at  feurgdorf  "^d 
Yverdoncame  to  be  "show  places,"  even  in  a  land  lilled"with  nat- 
uraTwondersi  Observers  and  students  came  from  America'  (R. 
268)  and  from  all  over  Europe  to  see  and  to  teach  in  his  school, 
and  draw  inspiration  from  seeing  his  work  (R.  270)  and  talking 
with  him.  In  particular  the  educators  of  Prussia  were  attracted 
by  his  work,  and,  earlier  than  other  nations,  saw  the  far-reaching 
significance  of  his  discoveries.  Herbart  visited  his  school  as  early 
as  1799,  when  but  a  young  man  of  twenty-three,  and  wrote  a  verj^ 
sympathetic  description  of  his  new  methods.  Froebel  spent  the 
years  1808  to  18 10  as  a  teacher  at  Yverdon,  when  he  was  a  young 
man  of  twenty-six  to  eight.  "It  soOn  became  evident  to  me," 
wrote  Froebel,  "that  'Pestalozzi'  was  to  be  the  watchword  of  my 
life."  The  philosopher  Fichte,  whose  Addresses  (1807-08)  on  the 
condition  of  the  German  people  (page  315),  after  their  hu- 
miliating defeat  by  Napoleon,  did  much  to  reveal  to  Pmssia  the 
possibilities  of  national  regeneration  by  means  of  education,  had 


302       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

taught  in  Zurich,  knew  Pestalozzi,  and  afterward  exploited  his 
work  and  his  ideas  in  BerUn.  As  early  as  1803  an  envoy,  sent  by 
the  Prussian  King,  reported  favorably  on  Pestalozzi's  work,  and 
in  i8o4T*estalozzian  methods  were  authorized  for  the  primary 
schools  of  f*russia.  In  1808  seventeen  teachers  were  sent  to 
Switzerland,  at  the  expense  of  the  Prussian  Government,  to  spend 
three  years  in  studying  Pestalozzi's  ideas  and  methods.  On 
their  return,  these  and  others  spread  Pestalozzian  ideas  through- 
out Prussia.  A  pastor  and  teacher  from  Wiirtemberg,  Karl 
August  Zeller  (1774-1847),  came  to  Burgdorf  in  1803  to  study. 
In  1806  he  opened  a  training-school  for  teachers  in  Zurich,  and 
there  worked  out  a  plan  of  studies  based  on  the  work  of  Pesta- 
lozzi. This  was  printed  and  attracted  much  attention.  In  1808 
the  King  of  Wiirtemberg  listened  to  five  lectures  on  Pestalozzian 
methods  by  Zeller,  and  invited  him  to  a  position  as  school  inspec- 
tor in  his  State.  Before  he  had  done  but  a  few  months'  work  he 
was  called  to  Prussia,  to  organize  a  normal  school  and  begin  the 
introduction  of  Pestalozzian. ideas  there.  From  Prussia  the  ideas 
and  methods  of  Pestalozzi  gradually  spread  to  the  other  German 
States. 

Many  Swiss  teachers  were  trained  by  Pestalozzi,  and  these  also 
helped  to  extend  his  work  and  ideas  over  Switzerland.  Particu- 
larly in  German  Switzerland  did  his  ideas  take  root  and  reorgan- 
ize education.  As  a  result  modem  systems  of  education  made  an 
early  start  in  these  cgjitons.  One  of  Pestalozzi's  earliest  and  most 
faithful  teachers,  Hermann  Kriisi,  became  principal  of  the  Swiss 
normal  school  at  Gais^  and  trained  teachers  there  in  Pestalozzian 
methods.  Zeller's  pupils,  too,  did  much  to  spread  his  influence 
among  the  Swiss.  Pestalozzi's  ideas  were  also  carried  to  England, 
but  in  no  such  satisfactory  manner  as-  to  the  German  States. 
Where  German  lands  received  both  the  method  and  the  spirit, 
the  English  obtained  largely  the  form.  Later  Pestalozzian  ideas 
came  to  the  United  States,  at  first  largely  through  English  sources, 
and,  after  about  i860,  resulted  in  a  thoroughgoing  reorganization 
of  American  elementary  education. 

The  manual-labor  school  of  Fellenberg.  Of  the  Swiss  associ- 
ates and  followers  of  Pestalozzi  one  of  the  most  influential  was 
Phillip  Emanuel  von  Fellenberg  (i 771-1844).  Having  become 
convinced  that  correct  early  education  was  the  only  means  where- 
by the  State  might  be  elevated  and  the  lot  of  man  made  better, 
resolved  (1805)  to  devote  his  life  and  his  fortune  to  the  working 


NEW  THEORY  AND  SUBJECT-MATTER     303 

out  of  his  ideas.  For  a  short  time  associated  with  Pestalozzi,  he 
soon  withdrew  and  estabHshed,  on  his  own  estate,  an  Institution 
which  later  (i829)<;ame  to  comprise  the  following: 

-7  1,  A  farm  of  about  six  hundred  acres. 

'-f  2.  Workshops  for  manufacturing  clothing  and  tools. 

'*f^3.  A  printing  and  Uthographing  establishment. 

>'4.  A  literary  institution  for  the  education  of  the  well-to-do. 

xf  5.  A  lower  or  real  school,  which  trained  for  handicrafts  and  middle- 

class  occupations. 
■^  6.  An  agricultural  school  for  the  education  of  the  poor  as  farm 

laborers,  and  as  teachers  for  the  rural  schools. 

Fellenberg's  work  was  a  continuation  of  the  social-regeneration 
conception  of  education  held  by  Pfestalozzi,  and  contained  the 
germ-idea_of  all  our  agricultural  and 
industrial  education.  His  plan  was 
widely  copied  in  Switzerland,  Ger- 
many, England,  and  the  United  States. 
It  was  well  suited  to  the  United  States 
because  of  the  very  democratic  condi- 
tions then  prevailing  among  an  agri- 
cultural pepple  possessed  of  but  little 
wealth.  The  plan  of  combining  farm- 
ing and  schooling  made  for  a  time  a 
strong  appeal  to  Americans,  and  such 
schools  were  founded  in  many  parts 
of  the   country.'    The  idea  at  first         Fig.  72.  Fellenberg 

-.       .      -    •         •   •      u'  (1771-1844) 

was  to  unite  trammg  m  agriculture 

with  schooling,  but  it  was  soon  extended  to  the  rapidly  rising 
mechanical  pursuits  as  well.  The  plan,  however,  was  rather 
short-lived  in  the  United  States,  due  to  the  rise  of  manufacturing 
and  the  opening  of  rich  and  cheap  farms  to  the  westward,  and 
lasted  with  us  scarcely  two  decades.  More  than  one  hundred 
Reports  (R.  272)  were  pubUshed,  in  Europe  and  America,  on  this 
very  successful  experiment  in  a  combined  intellectual  and  manual- 
labor  type  of  education. 


^•Yfe 


IV.  REDIRECTION  OF  THE  ELEMENTARY  SCHOOL 

Significance  of  this  work.    Though  some  form  of  parish  school 
for  the  elements  of  religious  instruction  had  existed  in  many 
places  during  the  later  Middle  Ages,  and  foundations  providing 
A    for  some  type  of  elementary  instruction  had  appeared  here  and 


304        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

there  in  almost  all  lands,  the  elementary  vernacular  school,  as  we 
have  previously  pointed  out,  was  nevertheless  clearly  the  out- 
come of  the  Protestant  movement  in  the  sixteenth  century,  and 
in  its  origin  was  essentially  a  child  of  the  Church.  (A  child  of  the 
Church,  too,  for  more  than  two  centuries  the  elementary  vernacu- 
lar school  remained.  During  these  two  centuries  the  elementary 
school  made  slow  but  rather  unsatisfactory  progress,  due  largely 
to  there  being  no  other  motive  for  its  maintenance  or  expansion 
than  the  original  religious  purpose.  Only  in  the  New  England 
Colonies  in  North  America,  in  some  of  the  provinces  of  the  Neth- 
erlands, and  in  a  few  of  the  German  States  had  any  real  progress 
been  made  in  evolving  any  different  type  of  school  out  of  this 
early  religious  creation,  and  even  in  these  places  the  change  was 
in  form  of  control  rather  than  in  subject-matter  or  purpose.  The 
school  remained  religious  in  purpose,  even  though  its  control  was 
beginning  to  pass  from  the  Church  to  the  State. 

Now,  within  half  a  century,  beginning  with  the  work  of  Rous- 
seau (1762),  and  by  means  of  the  labors  of  the  political  philoso- 
phers of  France,  the  Revolutionary  leaders  in  the  American  Colo- 
nies, the  legislative  AssembHes  and  Conventions  in  France,  and 
the  experimental  work  of  Basedow  and  his  followers  in  German 
lands  and  of  Pestalozzi  and  his  disciples  in  Switzerland,  the  whole 
purpose  and  nature  of  the  elementary  vernacular  school  was 
changed.  The  American  and  French  poUtical  revolutions  and  the 
more  peaceful  changes  in  England  had  ushered  in  new  concep- 
tions as  to  the  nature  and  purpose  and  duties  of  government.  As 
a  consequence  of  these  new  ideas,  education  had  come  to  be  re- 
garded in  a  new  light,  and  to  assume  a  new  importance  in  the 
eyes  of  statesmen,!  In  place  of  schools  to  serve  religious  and  sec- 
tarian ends,  and  maintained  as  an  adjunct  of  the  parishes  or  of  a 
State  Church,  the  elementary  vernacular  school  now  came  to  be 
conceived  of  as  an  instrument  of  the  State,  the  chief  purpose  of 
which  was  to  serve  state  ends.  Some  time  would,  of  course,  be 
required  to  develop  the  state  support  necessary  to  effect  the  com- 
plete transformation  in  control,  and  the  forces  of  reaction  would 
naturally  delay  the  process  as  much  as  possible,  but  the  theory  of 
state  purpose  had  at  last  been  so  effectively  proclaimed,  and  the 
forces  of  a  modem  world  were  pushing  the  idea  so  steadily  for- 
ward, that  it  was  only  a  question  of  time  until  the  change  would 
be  effected. 

A  new  impetus  for  change  in  control.    Basedow  and  Pestalozzi, 


NEW  THEORY  AND  SUBJECT-MATTER    305 

too,  had  given  the  movement  for  a  transfer  of  control  a  new  im- 
petus by  working  out  new  methods  in  instruction  and  in  organiz- 
ing new  subject-matter  for  the  school,  and  methods  and  subject- 
matter  which  harmonized  with  the  spirit  and  principles  of  the  new 
democracy  that  had  been  proclaimed.  Pestalozzi  in  particular 
had  sought,  guided  by  a  clearer  insight  into  the  educational  prob- 
lem than  Basedow  possessed  (R.  271),  to  create  a  school  in  which 
children  might,  under  the  wise  guidance  of  the  teacher,  develop 
and"StfSigthen  their  own  ''faculties''  and  thus  evolve  into  reason- 
ing, self^lirecliing  human  beings,  fitted  for  usefulness  and  service 
in  a  modem  world.""  To  make  intelligent  and  reasoning  individuA 
alSncjf'aircitizensT^o  "develop  moral  and  civic  character,  to  train  ] 
for  life  in  organized  society,  and  to  serve  as  an  instrument  by 
means  of  which  an  ignorant,  drunken,  immoral,  and  shiftless 
working-class  and  peasantry  might  be  elevated  into  men  and 
women  of  character,  intelligence,  and  directive  power,  was  in 
Pestalozzi 's  conception  the  underlying  meaning  of  the  school.^ 
After  Pestalozzy^e  earlier  conception  as  to  the  religious  purpose 
of  the  elementary  vernacular  schools,  by  means  of  which  children 
were  to  be  traiiied~aImost~excIirsiveIy  "in  the  principles  of  our 
holy  religion"  aad  to  become  **T6yal  church  membcK^^anJ  to 
"fit  them  for  that  station  Ln'Tife  in  which  it  hath  pleased  their 
Heavenly  Father  to  place  them,"  was  doomed.  In  its  stead 
there^wascertain  to  arise  a  newer  conception  of  the  school  as  an 
instrument  of  that  form  of  organized  society  known  as  the  State, 
and  maintained  by  the  State  to  traSi  its  future  cTtizens^for  intelli- 
gent  participation  in  the  duties  and  obligations  of  citizenship,  and 
for  social, jnoral,  and  economic  efficiency^ 

TEe  way  now  becoming  clear.  After  two  hundred  and  fifty 
years  of  confusion  and  poUtical  failure,  the  way  was  now  at  last 
becoming  clear  for  the  creation  of  national  instead  of  church  sys- 
tems  of  elementary  education,  and  for  the  firm  estabUshment  of 
the  elementary  vemacidar  school  as  an  important  obhgation  to 
its  future  citizens  of  every  progressive  modem  State  and  the  com- 
mon birthright  of  all.  This  became  distinctively  thejwork  of  the 
nineteenth  century.  It  also^becamethe_wo^j>f  the  nineteenth 
century  to  gatHeF  up  the'  old  secondary-school  and  university 
foundations,  accumulated  through  the  ages,  and  remould  them  to 
meet  modem  needs,  fuse  them  mto  the  naSonaJj_school_  systems 
created,  and  connect  them  in  some  manner  with  the  people's 
schools,     io  see  fiow  this  was  done  we  next  turn  to  the  begm- 


3d6        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

nings  of  the  organization  of  national  school  systems  in  the  German 
States,  France,  England,  and  the  United  States.  These  may  be 
taken  as  types.  As  Prussia  was  the  first  modern  State  to  grasp 
the  significance  of  national  education,  and  to  organize  state  schools, 
we  shall  begin  our  study  by  first  tracing  the  steps  by  which 
this  transformation  was  effected  there.  ,  - 

QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

1.  Compare  the  statement  of  the  valuable  elements  in  the  theories  of  Rous- 
seau (p.  293)  with  the  main  ideas  of  Basedow  (p.  295);  Ratke  (p.  220); 
Comenius  (p.  221).  a  0, 

2.  Do  we  accept  all  the  fourteen  points  of  Rousseau's  theory  to-day?  >  ^  ^ 

3.  Might  a  Rousseau  have  done  work  of  similar  importance  in  Russia,  early 
in  the  twentieth  century?    Why?  / '  ..  - .    '      / 

4.  Explain  the  educational  significance  of  "self-activity,"  "sense  impres-  ^^ 
sions,"  and  "harmonious  development." '•  fc  <■         /    .fit,  ,<* '•f\ 

5.  What  were  the  strong  points  in  the  experimental  work  of  Basedow?2'7  *»' 

6.  Explain  the  great  enthusiasm  which  his  rather  visionary  statements  and 
plans  awakened.  ^^    '^  ': 

7.  Show  the  importance  of  such  work  as  that  of  Basedow  in  preparing  the. 
way  for  better-organized  reform  work,  ^"f^*/ 

8.  How  far  was  Pestalozzi  right  as  to  the  power  of  education  to  give  men 
intellectual  and  moral  freedom?    3  '/  \- 

9.  What  do  vou  understand  Pestalozzi  to  have  meant  by  "  the  development 
of  the  faculties"?  •-',      «    ' 

10.  State  the  importance  of  the  work  of  Pestalozzi  from  the  point  of  view 
of  showing  the  world  how  to  deal  with  orphans  and  defectives. 

11.  Show  how  the  germs  of  agricultural  and  technical  education  lay  in  the 
work  of  Fellenberg.  ''.'   ^    - 

12.  Explain  the  greater  popularit}'^  of  the  Emile  in  German  lands.  2  '^•r 

13.  State  the  change  in  subject-matter  and  aims  from  the  vernacular  church 
school  to  the  school  as  thought  out  by  Pestalozzi.  *i  '  r     -  ^ 

14.  Show  that  it  was  a  fortunate  conjunction  that  brought  the  work  of  Pesta-     ^ 
lozzi  alongside  of  that  of  the  political  reformers  of  France.      '/  ^  '  P  "/  ^  ^^ 

15.  What  differences  might  there  have  been  had  Comenius  lived  and  done 
his  work  in  the  time  of  Pestalozzi?  ''^  J    J 

SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  selections,  illustrative 
of  the  contents  of  this  chapter,  are  reproduced: 

264.  Rousseau:  Illustrative  Selections  from  the  Emile. 

265.  Basedow:  Instruction  in  the  Philanthropinum. 

266.  Basedow:  A  Page  from  the  Elementarwerk. 

267.  Pestalozzi:  Explanation  of  his  Work. 

268.  Griscom:  A  Visit  to  Pestalozzi  at  Yverdon. 

269.  Woodbridge:  An  Estimate  of  Pestalozzi's  Work. 

270.  Dr.  Mayo:  On  Pestalozzi. 

271.  Woodbridge:  Work  of  Pestalozzi  and  Basedow  compared. 

272.  Griscom:  Hofwyl  as  seen  by  an  American. 


NEW  THEORY  AND  SUBJECT-MATTER    307 


SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

*Anderson,  L.  F.     "The  Manual-Labor-School  Movement";  in  Educa- 
tional Review,  vol.  46,  pp.  369-88.     (November,  1913.) 

Barnard,  Henry.    Pestalozzi  and  his  Educational  System. 
*Compayre,  G.    Jean-Jacques  Rousseau. 
*Compayre,  G.     Pestalozzi  and  Elementary  Education. 
*Guimps,  Roger  de.     Pestalozzi:  his  Aim  and  Work. 
*Krusi,  Hermann,  Jr.     Life  and  Work  of  Pestalozzi. 
*Parker,  S.  C.     History  of  Modern  Ediication,  chaps.  8,  9,  13-16. 
*Pestalozzi,  J.  H.     Leonard  and  Gertrude. 

Pestalozzi,  J.  H.     How  Gertrude  teaches  her  Children. 

Pinloche,  A.     Pestalozzi  and  the  Foundations  of  the  Modern  Elementary 
School. 


CHAPTER  XXII  ' 

NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN  PRUSSIA 
I.  THE  BEGINNINGS  OF  NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION 

Early  German  progress  in  school  organization.  The  first  mod- 
em nation  to  take  over  the  school  from  the  Church,  and  to  make 
of  it  an  instrument  for  promoting  the  interests  of  the  State  was 
Prussia,  and  the  example  of  Prussia  was  soon  followed  by  the 
other  German  States.  The  reasons  for  this  early  action  by  the 
German  States  will  be  clear  if  we  remember  the  marked  progress 
made  in  estabhshing  state  control  of  the  churches  (p.  169)  which 
followed  the  Protestant  Revolts  in  German  lands.  Figure  36, 
page  169,  reexamined  now,  will  make  the  reason  for  the  earlier 
evolution  of  state  education  in  Germany  plain.  Wiirtemberg, 
as  early  as  1559,  had  organized  the  first  German  state-church 
school  system,  and  had  made  attendance  at  the  religious  instruc- 
tion compulsory  on  the  parents  of  all  children.  The  example 
of  Wiirtemberg  was  followed  by  Brunswick  (1569),  Saxony 
(1580),  Weimar  (1619),  and  Gotha  (1642).  In  Weimar  and 
Gotha  the  compulsory-attendance  idea  had  even  been  adopted 
for  elementary-school  instruction  to  all  children  up  to  the  age 
of  twelve. 

By  the  middle  of  the  seventeenth  century  most  of  the  German 
States,  even  including  Catholic  Bavaria,  had  followed  the  example 
of  Wiirtemberg,  and  had  created  a  state-church  school  system 
/  which  involved  at  least  elementary  and  secondary  schools  and  the 
beginnings  of  compulsory  school  attendance.  Notwithstanding 
the  ravages  of  the  Thirty  Years'  War  (1618-48),  the  state-church 
schools  of  German  lands  contained,  more  definitely  than  had  been 
worked  out  elsewhere,  the  germs  of  a  separate  state  school  organi- 
zation. Only  in  the  American  Colonies  (p.  195)  had  an  equal  de- 
velopment in  state-church  organization  and  control  been  made. 
As  state- church  schools,  with  the  religious  purpose  dominant,  the 
German  schools  remained  until  near  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth 
century.  Then  a  new  movement  for  state  control  began,  and 
within  fifty  years  thereafter  they  had  been  transformed  into  in- 
J  stitutions  of  the  State,  with  the  state  purpose  their  most  essential 
characteristic.    How  this  transformation  was  effected  in  Prussia, 


NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN  PRUSSIA    309 

the  leader  among  the  German  States,  and  the  forces  which 
brought  about  the  transformation,  it  will  be  the  purpose  of  this 
chapter  to  relate. 
The  earliest  school  laws  for  Prussia.  In  17 13  there  came  to 
^  the  kingship  of  Prussia  an  organizing  genius  in  the  person  of  Fred- 
eric William  I  (1713-40).  Under  his  direction  Prussia  was  given, 
for  the  first  time,  a  centralized  and  uniform  financial  administra- 
tion, and  the  beginnings  of  state  school  organization  were  made. 
Though  he  cared  nothing  and  did  nothing  for  the  universities, 
the  religious  reform  movement  of  Francke,  as  well  as  his  edu- 
cational undertakings,  found  in  the  new  King  a  warm  supporter. 
Largely  in  consequence  of  this  the  King  became  deeply  inter- 
ested in  attempts  to  improve  and  advance  the  education  of  the 
masses  of  his  people. 

The  first  year  of  his  reign  he  issued  a  Regulatory  Code  for  the 
Reformed  Evangelical  and  Latin  schools  of  Prussia,  and  in  171 7 
he  issued  the  so-called  "  Ad\asory  Order,"  relating  to  the  people's 
schools.  In  this  latter  parents  were  urged,  under  penalty  of 
"vigorous  punishment,"  to  send  their  children  to  school  to  learn 
rehgion,  reading,  writing,  to  calculate,  and  "all  that  could  serve 
to  promote  their  happiness  and  welfare."  The  tuition  fees  of 
poor  children  he  ordered  paid  out  of  the  community  poor-box  (R. . 
273).  The  following  year  he  directed  the  authorities  of  Lithuania 
to  relieve  the  existing  ignorance  there,  and  sent  commissioners  to 
provide  the  villages  with  schoolmasters.  From  time  to  time  he 
renewed  his  directions.  To  insure  a  better  class  of  teachers  for 
the  towns  and  rural  schools,  he,  in  1722,  directed  that  no  one  be 
admitted  to  the  office  of  sacristan-schoolmaster  except  tailors, 
weavers,  smiths,  wheelwrights,  and  carpenters,  and  in  1738  he 
further  restricted  the  position  of  teacher  in  the  town  and  rural 
schools  to  tailors. 

7^  In  1737  the  King  issued  his  celebrated  Principia  Regulativey 
which  henceforth  became  the  fundamental  School  Law  for  the 
province  of  East  Prussia.  This  prescribed  conditions  for  the 
building  of  schoolhouses,  the  support  of  the  schoolmaster,  tuition 
fees,  and  government  aid.  The  following  digest  of  the  section  of 
the  Principia  relating  to  these  matters  gives  a  good  idea  as  to  the 
nature  of  the  school  regulations  the  King  sought  to  enforce: 

1.  The  parishes  forming  school  societies  were  obUged  to  build  school- 
houses  and  to  keep  them  in  repair. 

2.  The  State  was  to  furnish  the  necessary  timber  and  firewood. 


3IO       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


Fig.  73.  The  School  of  a  Handworker 

Q>nducted  in  his  home.  A  gentleman  visiting  the  school.  After  a  drawing  in  the 
German  School  Museum  in  BerUn. 

3.  The  expenses  for  doors,  windows,  and  stoves  to  be  obtained  from 
collections. 

4.  Every  church  to  pay  four  thalers  a  year  toward  the  support  of  the 
schoolmaster. 

5.  Tuition  fees  for  each  child,  from  four  to  twelve  years  of  age,  to  be 
four  groschen  per  year. 

6.  Government  to  pay  the  fee  when  a  peasant  sends  more  than  one 
child  to  school. 

7.  The  peasants  to  furnish  the  teacher  with  certain  provisions. 

8.  The  teacher  to  have  the  right  of  free  pasture  for  his  small  stock 
and  some  fees  from  every  child  confirmed. 

9.  Government  to  give  the  teacher  one  acre  of  land,  which  villagers 
were  to  till  for  him. 

In  1738  the  King  further  regulated  the  private  schools  and 
teachers  in  and  about  Berlin,  in  particular  dealing  with  their 
qualifications  and  fees.  The  King  showed,  for  the  time,  an  inter- 
est heretofore  almost  unknown  in  and  solicitude  for  the  education 
of  his  people.  That  his  decrees  were  in  advance  of  the  possibili- 
ties of  the  people  in  the  matter  of  school  support  is  not  to  be  won- 


NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN  PRUSSIA     311 

dered  at.  Still,  they  rendered  useful  service  in  preparing  the  way 
for  further  organizing  work  by  his  successors,  and  in  particular  in 
accustoming  the  people  to  the  ideas  of  state  oversight  and  local 
school  support.  Under  his  successor  and  son,  Frederick  the 
Great,  the  preparatory  work  of  the  father  bore  important  fruit. 

The  organizing  work  of  Frederick  the  Great.  In  1 740  Freder- 
ick II,  sumamed  the  Great,  succeeded  his  father,  and  in  turn 
guided  the  destinies  of  Prussia  for  forty-six  years.  In  1740, 
1 741,  and  again  in  1743  he  issued  "regulations  concerning  the 
support  of  schools  in  the  villages  of  Prussia,"  in  which  he  di- 
rected that  new  schools  should  be  estabhshed,  teachers  provided 
for  them,  and  that  "the  existing  school  regulations  and  the  ar- 
rangements made  in  pursuance  thereto  should  be  permanent,  and 
that  no  change  should  be  made  under  any  pretext  whatever." 

In  1750  he  effected  a  centralization  of  all  the  prov-incial  church 
consistories,  except  that  of  Cathohc  Silesia,  under  the  Berlin  Con- 
sistory. This  was  a  centralizing  measure  of  large  future  impor- 
tance, as  it  centralized  the  administration  of  the  schools,  as  well  as 
that  of  the  churches,  and  transformed  the  Berlin  Consistory  into 
an  important  administrative  agent  of  the  central  government. 
To  this  new  centralized  administrative  organization  the  King  is- 
sued instructions  to  pay  special  attention  to  schools,  in  order  that 
they  might  be  furnished  with  able  schoolmasters  and  the  young  be 
well  educated.  One  of  the  results  of  this  centralization  was  the 
gradual  evolution  of  the  modem  German  Gymnasien,  with  uni- 
form standards  and  unproved  instruction,  out  of  the  ojd  and 
weakened  Latin  schools  of  various  types  within  the  kingdom. 

From  1756  to  1763  Frederick  was  engaged  in  a  struggle  for 
existence,  known  as  the  Seven  Years'  War,  but  as  soon  as  peace 
was  at  hand  the  King  issued  new  regulations  "concerning  the 
maintenance  of  schools,"  and  began  employing  competent  school- 
masters for  his  royal  estates.  In  April,  1763,  he  issued  instruc- 
tions to  have  a  series  of  general  school  regulations  prepared  for  all 
Prussia.  These  were  drawn  up  by  Julius  Hecker,  a  former  pupil 
and  teacher  in  Francke's  Institution,  and  now  become  a  pastor  in 
Berhn  and  counselor  for  the  Berlin  Consistory.  After  approval 
by  the  King,  these  were  issued,  September  23,  1763,  under  the 
title  oi  General  Land-Schule  Reglement  (general  school  regulations 
for  the  rural  and  village  schools)  of  all  Prussia  (R.  274).  These 
new  regulations  constituted  the  first  general  School  Code  for  the 
whole  kingdom,  and  mark  the  real  foundation  of  the  Prussian 


312        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

elementary-school  system.  Two  years  later  (1765)  a  similar  but 
stronger  set  of  regulations  or  Code  was  drawn  up  and  promul- 
gated for  the  government  of  the  Catholic  elementary  schools  in 
the  province  of  Silesia  (R.  275).  This  was  a  new  province  which 
Frederick  had  wrested  by  force  a  few  years  previously  (1748) 
from  Maria  Theresa  of  Austria,  and  the  addition  of  a  large  number 
of  Catholics  to  Prussia  caused  Frederick  to  issue  specific  regula- 
tions for  schools  among  them. 

These  two  School  Codes  did  not  so  much  bring  already  existing 
schools  into  a  state  system,  but  rather  set  up  standards  and  obli- 
gations for  an  elementary-school  system  in  part  to  be  created  in 
the  future.  The  schools  were  still  left  under  the  supervision  and 
direction  of  the  Church,  but  the  State  now  undertook  to  tell  the 
Church  what  it  must  do.  To  enforce  the  obligation  the  State 
Inspectors  of  Prussia  were  directed  to  make  an  annual  inspection 
(R.  274,  §  26)  of  all  schools,  and  to  forward  a  report  on  their  in- 
spection to  the  Berlin  Consistory. 

These  new  Codes  met  with  resistance  everywhere.  The  money 
for  the  execution  of  such  a  comprehensive  project  was  not  as  yet 
generally  available;  parents  and  churches  objected  to  taxation 
and  to  the  loss  of  their  children  from  work ;  the  wealthy  landlords 
objected  to  the  financial  burden;  the  standards  for  teachers  later 
on  (1779)  had  to  be  lowered,  and  veterans  from  Frederick's  wars 
installed ;  and  the  examinations  of  teachers  had  to  be  made  easy 
to  secure  teachers  at  all  for  the  schools.  While  there  continued 
for  some  decades  to  be  a  vast  difference  between  the  actual  condi- 
tions in  the  schools  and  the  requirements  of  these  Codes,  and  while 
the  real  establishment  of  a  state  school  system  awaited  the  first 
decade  of  the  nineteenth  century  for  its  accomplishment,  much 
valuable  progress  in  organization  nevertheless  was  made.  In 
principle,  at  least,  Frederick  the  Great,  by  the  Codes  of  1763  and 
1765,  effected  for  elementary  education  a  transition  from  the  I 
church  school  of  the  Protestant  Reformation,  and  for  Catholic 
Silesia  from  the  parish  school  of  the  Church,  to  the  state  school  of 
the  nineteenth  century.  It  remained  only  for  his  successors  to 
realize  in  practice  what  he  had  made  substantial  beginnings  of  in 
law.  Nowhere  else  in  Europe  that  early  had  such  progress  in 
educational  organization  been  made.  ^ 

Despite  these  many  important  educational  efforts,  though,  the 
type  and  the  work  of  teachers  remained  low  throughout  the  whole 
of  the  eighteenth  century.     In  the  rural  and  village  schools  the 


NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN  PRUSSIA     313 

teachers  continued  to  be  deficient  in  number  and  lacking  in  prepa- 
ration. Often  the  pastors  had  first  to  give  to  invalids,  cripples, 
shoemakers,  tailors,  watchmen,  and  herdsmen  the  rudimentary 
knowledge  they  in  turn  imparted  to  the  children.  In  the  towns 
of  fair  size  the  conditions  were  not  much  better  than  in  the  vil- 
lages. The  elementary  school  of  the  middle-sized  towns  generally 
had  but  one  class,  common  for  boys  and  girls,  and  the  magis- 
trates did  little  to  improve  the  condition  of  the  schools  or  the 
teachers.  In  the  larger  cities,  and  even  in  Berlin,  the  number  of 
elementary  schools  was  insufficient,  the  schools  were  crowded, 
and  many  children  had  no  opportunity  to  attend  schools.  In 
Leipzig  there  was  no  pubhc  school  until  1792,  in  which  year  the 
city  free  school  was  estabhshed.  Even  Sunday  schools,  supported 
by  subscription,  had  been  resorted  to  by  Berlin,  after  1798,  to 
provide  journeymen  and  apprentices  with  some  of  the  rudiments 
of  an  education.  The  creation  of  a  state  school  system  out  of  the 
insufficient  and  inefficient  religious  schools  proved  a  task  of  large 
dimensions,  in  Prussia  as  in  other  lands.  Even  as  late  as  18 19. 
Dinter  found  discouraging  conditions  (R.  279)  among  the  teachers 
of  East  Prussia. 

Further  late  eighteenth-century  progress.  Frederick  the 
Great  died  in  1786.  In  the  reign  of  his  successors  his  work  bore 
fruit  in  a  complete  transfer  of  all  schools  from  church  to  state  con- 
trol, and  in  the  organization  of  the  strongest  system  of  state 
schools  the  world  had  ever  known.  The  year  following  the  death 
of  Frederick  the  Great  (1787),  and  largely  as  an  outgrowth  of  the 
preceding  centralizing  work  with  reference  to  elementary  educa- 
tion, the  Superior  School  {Ohersdmlcollegium)  Board  was  estab- 
lished to  exercise  a  similar  centralized  control  over  the  older  sec- 
ondary and  higher  schools  of  Prussia.  Secondary  and  higher  edu^ 
cation  were  now  severed  from  church  control,  in  principle  at  least, 
as  elementary  education  had  been  by  the  "Regulations"  of  1763 
and  1765. 

In  1794  came  the  culmination  of  all  the  preceding  work  in  the 
publication  of  the  General  Civil  Code  {Allgemeine  Landrecht)  for 
the  State,  in  which,  in  the  section  relating  to  schools,  the  following 
important  declaration  was  made: 

Schools  and  universities  are  state  institutions,  charged  with  the 
instruction  of  youth  in  useful  information  and  scientific  knowledge. 
Such  institutions  may  be  founded  only  with  the  knowledge  and  con- 
sent of  the  State.     All  pubUc  schools  and  educational  institutions  are 


314       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

under  the  supervision  of  the  State,  and  are  at  all  times  subject  to  its 
examination  and  inspection. 

The  secular  authority  and  the  clergy  were  still  to  share  jointly  in 
the  control  of  the  schools,  but  both  according  to  rules  laid  down 
by  the  State.  In  all  cases  of  conflict  or  dispute,  the  secular 
authority  was  to  decide.  This  important  document  forms  the 
Magna  Charta  for  secular  education  in  Prussia.  During  the  dec- 
ade which  followed  the  promulgation  of  this  declaration  of 
state  control  but  little  additional  progress  of  importance  was 
accompHshed. 

I  0^1  A  STATE  SCHOOL  SYSTEM  AT  LAST  CREATED 

The  humiliation  of  Prussia.  Having  humiliated  the  Austrians 
and  vanquished  the  Russians,  Napoleon  now  goaded  the  Prus- 
sians into  attacking  him,  and  then  utterly  humiUated  them  in 
turn.  At  the  battle  of  Jena  (October  14, 1806)  the  Prussian  army 
was  utterly  routed,  and  forced  back  almost  to  the  Russian  fron- 
tier. Officered  by  old  generals  and  political  favorites  who  were 
no  longer  efficient,  and  backed  by  a  state  service  honeycombed 
with  inefficiency  and  corruption,  the  Prussian  army  that  had 
won  such  victories  under  Frederick  the  Great  was  all  but  anni- 
hilated by  the  new  and  efficient  fighting  machine  created  by  the 
Corsican  who  now  controlled  the  destinies  of  France.  By  the 
Treaty  of  Tilsit  (July  7,  1807)  Prussia  lost  all  her  lands  west  of 
the  Elbe  and  nearly  all  her  stealings  from  Poland  —  in  all  about 
one  half  her  territory  and  population  —  and  was  almost  stricken 
from  the  list  of  important  powers  in  Europe.  In  all  its  history 
Prussia  had  experienced  no  such  humiliation  as  this.  In  a  few 
months  the  constructive  work  of  a  century  had  been  undone. 

The  regeneration  of  Prussia.  The  new  national  German  feel- 
ing, which  had  been  slowly  rising  for  half  a  century,  now  burst 
forth  and  soon  worked  a  regeneration  of  the  State.  In  the  school 
of  adversity  the  King  and  the  people  learned  much,  and  the  task 
of  national  reorganization  was  entrusted  to  a  series  of  able  minis.-- 
ters  whom  the  King  and  his  capable  Queen,  Louise,  now  called 
Into  serviced  Serfdom  was  abolished,  local  government  was 
granted  to  the  cities,  legislative  assemblies  were  organized,  the 
army  was  reorganized  and  compulsory  military  service  begun, 
and  efiiciency  was  introduced  into  the  state  service. 

Though  the  abolition  of  serfdom,  the  reform  of  the  civil  service, 
and  the  beginnings  of  local  and  representative  government  were 


NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN  PRUSSIA    315 

important  gains,  nothing  was  of  secondary  importance  to  the 
complete  reorganization  of  education  which  now  took  placed  The 
education  of  the  people  was  turned  to  in  earnest  for  the  regenera- 
tion of  the  national  spirit,  and  education  was,  in  a  decade,  made 
the  great  constructive  agent  of  the  State.     Said  the  King: 

Though  we  have  lost  many  square  miles  of  land,  though  the  country 
has  been  robbed  of  its  external  power  and  splendor,  yet  we  shall  and 
will  gain  in  intrinsic  power  and  splendor,  and  therefore  it  is  my  earnest 
wish  that  the  greatest  attention  be  paid  to  pubhc  instruction.  .  .  .  The 
State  must  regain  in  mental  force  what  it  has  lost  in  physical  force. 

Fichte  appeals  to  the  leaders.  Still  more  did  the  philosopher 
Fichte  (i 762-1814),  in  a  series  of  "Addresses  to  the  German  Na- 
tion," delivered  in  Berlin  during  the  winter  of  1807-08,  appeal 
to  the  leaders  to  turn  to  education  to  rescue  the  State  from  the 
miseries  which  had  overwhelmed  it.  Unable  forcibly  to  resist, 
and  with  every  phase  of  the  government  determined  by  a  foreign 
conqueror,  only  education  had  been  overlooked,  he  said,  and  to 
this  the  leaders  should  turn  for  national  redemption  (R.  277). 

Fichte's  Addresses  stirred  the  thinkers  among  the  German  peo- 
ple as  they  had  not  been  stirred  since  the  days  of  the  Reforma- 
tion, and  a  national  reorganization  of  education,  with  national 
ends  in  view,  now  took  place.  As  Duke  Ernest  remade  Gotha, 
after  the  raA^ages  of  the  Thirty  Years'  War,  by  means  of  education 
(p.  1 68) /so  the  leaders  of  Prussia  now  created  a  new  national 
spirit  by  tSkilig  over  the  school  from  the  Church  and  forging  it 
into  one  of  the  greatest  constructive  instruments  of  the  State. 
The  result  showed  itself  in  the  "Uprising  of  Prussia,"  in  the  win^ 
ter  of  1812-13;  the  "War  of  Liberation,"  of  1813-15;  the  utter 
defeat  of  Napoleon  at  the  battle  of  Leipzig  by  Russia,  Prussia, 
and  Austria,  in  18 13 ;  and  again  at  the  battle  of  Waterloo  by  Eng- 
Jand  and  Prussia,  in  1815.  Still  more  clearly  was  the  result 
shown  in  the  humiliating  defeat  of  France,  in  187c,  when  it  was 
commonly  remarked  that  the  schoolmaster  of  Prussia  had  at  last 
triumphed.  The  regeneration  of  Prussia  in  the  early  part  of  the 
nineteenth  century,  as  well  as  its  more  recent  hiuniliation,  stand 
as  elpquent  testimonials  to  the  tremendous  influence  of  education 
on  national  destiny,  when  rightly  and  when  wrongly  directed. 

The  reorganization  of  elementary  education.  The  first  step  in 
the  process  of  educational  reorganization  was  the  abolition  (1807) 
of  the  Oherschulcollegium  Board,  established  (p.  313)  in  1787  to 
supervise  secondary  and  higher  education,  in  order  to  get  rid  of 


3i6       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


Fig.  74.  DiNTER  (i 760-1831) 

Director  of  Teachers'  Seminaries  in 
Saxony;  Superintendent  of  Educa- 
tion in  East  Prussia. 


clerical  influence  and  control.    The  next  step  was  the  creation  in- 
stead (1808)  of  a  Department  of  Public  Instruction,  organized  as 

a  branch  of  the  Interior  Department 
of  the  State. 

One  of  the  first  steps  of  the  acting 
head  of  the  new  department  was  to 
send  seventeen  Prussian  teachers 
(1808)  to  Switzerland  to  spend  three 
years,  at  the  expense  of  the  Govern- 
ment, in  studying  Pestalozzi's  ideas 
and  methods,  and  they  were  partic- 
ularly enjoined  that  they  were  not 
sent  primarily  to  get  the  mechanical 
side  of  the  method,  but  to 

warm  yourselves  at  the  sacred  fire 
which  burns  in  the  heart  of  this  man, 
so  full  of  strength  and  love,  whose  work 
has  remained  so  far  below  what  he 

originally  desired,  below  the  essential  ideas  of  his  life,  of  which  the 

method  is  only  a  feeble  product. 

You  will  have  reached  perfection  when  you  have  clearly  seen  that 

education  is  an  art,  and  the  most  sublime 

and  holy  of  all,  and  in  what  connection 

it  is  with  the  great  art  of  the  education 

of  nations. 

In  1809  Garl  August  Zeller  (1774- 
1847),  ^  pupil  of  Pestalozzi,  who  had 
established  two  Pestalozzian  training- 
colleges  in  Switzerland  and  ,had  just 
begun  to  hold  Pestalozzian  institutes 
in  Wiirtemberg  (p.  302),  was  called 
to  Prussia  to  organize  a  Teachers' 
Seminary  (normal  school)  to  train 
teachers  in  the  Pestalozzian  methods. 
The  seventeen  Prussian  teachers,  on 
their  return  from  study  with  Pesta- 
lozzi, were  also  made  directors  of 
training  institutions,  or  provincial 
superintendents  of  instruction.  In 
this  way  Pestalozzian  ideas  were  soon 
in  use  in  the  elementary  schoolrooms  of  Prussia,  and  so  effective 
was  this  work,  and  so  readily  did  the  Prussian  teachers  catch 


Fig.  75.   DiESTERWEG 

(1790-1866) 

Director  of  Teachers'  Semina- 
ries at  Maurs  (1820-33)  and  Ber- 
lin (1833-49).  "Der  deutsche 
Pestalozzi" 


NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN  PRUSSIA    317 

the  spirit  of  Pestalozzi's  endeavors,  that  at  the  Berlin  celebra- 
tion of  the  centennial  of  his  birth,  in  1846,  the  German  educator 
Diesterweg  said: 

By  these  men  and  these  means,  men  trained  in  the  Institution  at 
Yverdon  under  Pestalozzi,  the  study  of  his  publications,  and  the  appU- 
cations  of  his  methods  in  the  model  and  normal  schools  of  Prussia, 
after  1808,  was  the  present  Prussian,  or  rather  Prussian-Pestalozzian 
school  system  estabHshed,  for  he  is  entitled  to  at  least  one  half  the 
fame  of  the  German  popular  schools. 

Similarly  Gustavus  Friedrich  Dinter,  who  early  distinguished 
himself  as  principal  of  a  Teachers'  Seminary  in  Saxony,  was  called 
to  Prussia  and  made  School  Counselor  (Superintendent)  for  the 
province  of  East  Prussia.  Wherever  Prussia  could  find  men,  in 
other  States,  who  knew  Pestalozzian  methods  and  possessed  the 
new  conception  of  education,  they  were  called  to  Prussia  and  put 
to  work,  and  the  statement  of  Dinter  was  characteristic  of  the 
spirit  which  animated  their  work.    He  said: 

I  promised  God,  that  I  would  look  upon  every  Prussian  peasant 
child  as  a  being  who  could  complain  of  me  before  God,  if  I  did  not  pro- 
vide him  with  the  best  education,  as  a  man  and  a  Christian,  which  it 
was  possible  for  me  to  provide. 

Work  of  the  Teachers*  Seminaries.  Napoleon  had  imposed 
heavy  financial  indemnities  on  Prussia,  as  well  as  loss  of  territory, 
and  the  material  means  with  which  to  establish  schools  were 
scanty  indeed.  With  a  keen  conception  of  the  practical  diflScul- 
ties,  the  leaders  saw  that  the  key  to  the  problem  lay  in  the  crea-v 
tion  of  a  new  type  of  teaching  force,  and  to  this  end  they  began 
from  the  first  to  establish  Teachers'  Seminaries.  Those  who  de- 
sired to  enter  these  institutions  were  carefully  selected,  and  out 
of  them  a  steady  stream  of  what  Horace  Mann  described  (R.  278) 
as  a  "beneficent  order  of  men"  were  sent  to  the  schools,  "mould- 
ing the  character  of  the  people,  and  carrying  them  forward  in 
a  career  of  civilization  more  rapidly  than  any  other  people  in 
the  world  are  now  advancing."  Mann  described,  with  marked 
approval,  both  the  teacher  and  the  training  he  received. 

So  successful  were  these  institutions  that  within  a  decade, 
under  the  glow  of  the  new  national  spirit  animating  the  people, 
the  elementary  schools  were  largely  transformed  in  spirit  and 
purpose,  and  the  position  of  the  elementary-school  teacher  was 
elevated  from  the  rank  of  a  trade  (R.  279)  to  that  of  a  profession 


3i8       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

(R.  278).  By  1840,  when  the  earlier  fervor  had  died  out  and  a 
reaction  had  clearly  set  in,  there  were  in  Prussia  alone  thirty- 
eight  Teachers'  Seminaries  for  elementary  teachers,  approximately 
thirty  thousand  elementary  schools,  and  every  sixth  person  in 
Prussia  was  in  school.  In  the  other  German  States,  and  in 
Holland,  Sweden,  and  France,  analogous  but  less  extensive  prog- 
ress in  providing  normal  schools  and  elementary  schools  had 
been  made;  but  in  Austria,  which  did  not  for  long  follow  the 
Prussian  example,  the  schools  remained  largely  stationary  for 
more  than  half  a  century  to  come. 

Nationalizing  the  elementary  instruction.  That  the  system  of 
elementary  vernacular  or  people's  schools  (the  term  Volksschule 
now  began  to  be  applied)  now  created  should  be  permeated  by  a 
strong  nationalistic  tone  was,  the  times  and  circumstances  con- 
sidered, only  natural.  Though  the  Pestalozzian  theories  as  to 
the  development  of  the  mental  faculties,  training  through  the 
senses,  and  the  power  of  education  to  regenerate  society  were 
accepted,  along  with  the  new  Pestalozzian  subject-matter  and 
methods  in  instruction  (p.  302),  all  that  could  be  rendered  useful 
to  the  Prussian  State  in  its  extremity  naturally  was  given  special 
emphasis.  Thus  all  that  related  to  the  home  coimtry  —  geogra- 
phy, history,  and  the  German  speech  —  was  taught  as  much 
from  the  patriotic  as  from  the  pedagogical  point  of  view.  Music 
was  given  special  emphasis  as  preparatory  for  participation  in  the 
patriotic  singing-societies  and  festivals,  which  were  organized 
at  the  time  of  the  "Uprising  of  Prussia"  (1813).  Drawing  and 
arithmetic  were  emphasized  for  their  practical  values.  Physical- 
exercises  were  given  an  emphasis  before  unknown,  because  of 
their  hygienic  and  military  values.  Finally  religion  was  given  an  ■ 
importance  beyond  that  of  Pestalozzi's  school,  but  with  the  em- 
phasis now  placed  on  moral  earnestness,  humility,  self-sacrifice, 
and  obedience  to  authority,  rather  than  the  earUer  stress  on  the 
Catechism  and  church  doctrine. 

Clearly  perceiving,  decades  ahead  of  other  nations,  the  power 
of  such  training  to  nationalize  a  people  and  thus  strengthen  the 
State,  the  Prussian  leaders,  in  the  first  two  decades  of  the  nine- 
teenth century,  laid  the  foundations  of  that  training  of  the 
masses,  and  of  teachers  for  the  masses  (R.  280),  which,  more  than 
any  other  single  item,  paved  the  way  for  the  development  of  a 
national  German  spirit,  the  unification  of  German  lands  into 
an  Imperial  German  Empire,  and  that  blind  trust  in  and  obedi- 


NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN  PRUSSIA    319 

ence  to  authority  which  has  recently  led  to  a  second  national 
humiliation. 

The  reorganization  of  secondary  education.  Alongside  this 
elementary-sqhool  system  for  the  masses  of  the  people,  the  older 
secondary  and  higher  school  system  for  a  directing  class  (p.  187) 
also  was  largely  reorganized  and  redirected. 

In  1810  the  examination  of  all  secondary-school  teachers,  ac- 
cording to  a  uniform  state  plan,  was  ordered.  The  examinations 
were  to  be  conducted  for  the  State  by  the  university  authorities; 
to  be  based  on  university  training  in  the  gymnasial  subjects,  with 
an  opportunity  to  reveal  special  preparation  in  any  subject  or  sub- 
jects; and  no  one  in  the  future  could  even  be  nominated  for  a  posi- 
tion as  a  gymnasial  teacher  who  had  not  passed  this  examination. 
This  meant  the  erection  of  the  work  of  teaching  in  the  secondary 
schools  into  a  distinct  profession ;  the  elimination  from  the  schools 
of  the  theological  student  who  taught  for  a  time  as  a  stepping- 
stone  to  a  church  living;  and  the  end  of  easy  local  examination 
and  approval  by  town  authorities  or  the  patrons  of  a  school.  To 
insure  still  better  preparation  of  candidates,  Pedagogical  Seminars 
were  begun  in  the  universities  for  imparting  to  future  gymnasial 
teachers  some  pedagogical  knowledge  and  insight  while  Philo- 
logical Seminars  also  appeared,  about  the  same  time,  to  give  ad- 
ditional training  in  understanding  the  spirit  of  instruction  in  the 
chief  subj'ects  of  the  gymnasial  course  —  the  classics.  In  1826  a 
year  of  trial  teaching  before  appointment  (Probejahr)  was  added 
for  all  candidates,  and  in  183 1  new  and  more  stringent  regulations 
for  the  examination  of  teachers  were  ordered.  At  least  two  gen- 
erations ahead  of  other  nations,  Prussia  thus  developed  a  body  of 
professional  teachers  for  its  secondary'  schools. 

Founding  of  the  University  of  Berlin.  One  result  of  the  Treaty 
of  Tilsit  (p.  314)  was  that  Prussia  had  lost  all  her  universities, 
except  three  along  the  Baltic  coast.  Both  Halle  and  Gottingen 
were  lost,  and  the  loss  of  Halle  was  a  severe  blow.  In  1807 
Fichte,  who  had  been  a  professor  at  Jena,  drew  up  a  plan  and  sub- 
mitted it  to  the  King  for  the  organization  of  a  new  university  at 
Berlin.  When  Humboldt  came  to  the  head  of  tlie  Department  of 
Public  Instruction  the  idea  at  once  won  his  enthusiastic  approval. 
In  May,  1809,  he  reported  favorably  on  the  project  to  the  King, 
and  three  months  later  a  Cabinet  Order  was  issued  creating  the 
new  university,  giving  it  an  annual  money  grant,  and  assigning  a 
royal  palace  to  it  for  a  home.    The  spirit  with  which  the  new  in- 


320        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

stitution  was  founded  may  be  inferred  from  the  following  extract 
from  a  memorial,  published  by  Humboldt,  in  1810.  In  this  he 
said: 

The  State  should  not  treat  the  universities  as  if  they  were  higher 
classical  schools  or  schools  of  special  sciences.  On  the  whole  the  State 
should  not  look  to  them  at  all  for  anything  that  directly  concerns  its 
own  interests,  but  should  rather  cherish  a  conviction  that,  in  fulfilling 
their  real  destination,  they  will  not  only  serve  its  own  purposes,  but 
serve  them  on  an  infinitely  higher  plane,  commanding  a  much  wider 
field  of  operation,  and  affording  room  to  set  in  motion  much  more 
efficient  springs  and  forces  than  are  at  the  disposal  of  the  State  itself. 

This  university  was  indeed  a  new  creation,  and  to  the  selection 
of  its  first  faculty  Humboldt  devoted  almost  all  his  energies 
during  the  period  he  remained  in  oflSce.  From  the  first,  high  at- 
tainment in  some  branch  of  knowledge,  and  the  ability  to  advance 
that  knowledge,  was  placed  ahead  of  mere  teaching  skill.  The 
most  eminent  scholars  in  all  lines  were  invited  to  the  new 
"chairs,"  and  when  it  opened  (1810)  its  first  faculty  represented 
the  highest  attainment  of  scholarship  in  German  lands.  From 
the  first  the  instruction  divested  itself  of  almost  all  that  charac- 
terized the  school.  The  lecture  replaced  the  classroom  recitation, 
and  the  seminar,  in  which  small  groups  of  advanced  students 
investigate  a  problem  under  the  direction  of  a  professor,  was  given 
a  place  of  large  importance  in  the  institution.  Original  research 
and  contributions  to  knowledge  marked  the  work  of  both  stu- 
dents and  professors,  the  object  being,  not  to  train  teachers  for 
the  schools,  but  to  produce  scholars  capable  of  advancing  knowl- 
edge by  personal  research. 

The  effect  on  the  other  German  universities  was  marked. 
Some  of  the  older  institutions  (Erfurt,  Wittenberg,  Cologne, 
Mainz)  died  out,  while  new  foundations  (Breslau,  181 1;  Bonn, 
1818;  Munich,  1826)  after  the  new  model,  took  their  place.  Those 
that  continued  were  changed  in  character,  and,  a  new  unity 
was  established  throughout  the  German  university  world.  By 
1850  exact  scientific  research,  in  both  libraries  and  laboratories, 
and  a  sober  search  for  truth,  had  become  the  watchword  of  all  the 
German  universities.  In  consequence  they  naturally  assumed  a 
world  leadership,  and  were  frequented  by  students  from  many 
lands.  Especially  has  the  United  States  been  influenced  in  its 
university  development  by  the  large  number  of  university  teach- 
ers who  received  their  specialized  training  in  the  German  univer- 
sities during  the  latter  half  of  the  nineteenth  century. 


NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN  PRUSSIA    321 


A  two-class  state  school  system  created.  We  thus  see  that 
Prussia  by  181 5,  clearly  by  1825,  had  taken  over  education  from 
the  Church  and  made  of  it  an  instru- 
ment of  the  State  to  serve  State  ends. 
For  the  masses  there  was  the  Volks- 
schule,  superseding  the  old  religious 
vernacular  school  and  clearly  designed 
to  create  an  intelligent  but  obedient 
and  patriotic  citizenship  for  the  Father- 
land, and  in  this  school  the  great  ma- 
jority of  the  children  of  the  State  re- 
ceived their  education  for  citizenship 
and  for  life.  This  was  for  both  sexes, 
and  was  entirely  a  German  school.  At- 
tendance upon  this  school  was  made 
compulsory,  and  beyond  this  some  con- 
tinuation education  early  began  to  be 
provided  (Rs.  274,  §6;  275  d;  276, 
§  15).  Within  the  past  half -century 
continuation  education,  especially  along 
vocational  lines,  as  we  shall  point 
out  in  a  subsequent  chapter,  has  re- 
ceived 'in  German  lands  a  very  re- 
markable development.  To  insure  that 
this  school  should  serve  the  State  in 
the  way  desired.  Teachers'  Seminaries, 
for  the  training  of  Volksschule  teachers,  were  from  the  first 
made  a  feature  of  the  new  state  system. 

For  those  who  were  to  form  the  oflScial  and  directing  class  of 
society  —  a  closely  limited,  almost  entirely  male,  intellectual 
aristocracy  —  education  in  separate  clfissical  schools,  with  uni- 
versity or  professional  training  superimp)osed,  was  provided,  and 
this  type  of  training  offered  a  very  thorough  preparation  for  a 
small  and  a  carefully  selected  class.  Out  of  this  class  the  leaders 
of  Germany  for  a  century  have  been  drawn.  For  this  classical 
school  also  the  universities  were  early  directed  to  prepare  a  well- 
educated  body  of  teachers.  The  Prussian  plan  was  followed  in 
all  its  essentials  in  the  other  German  States,  so  that  the  drawing 
given  (Fig.  76)  was  true  for  Germany  as  a  whole,  as  well  as  for 
Prussia,  up  at  least  to  1914. 

New  nineteenth-century  tendencies  manifested.    In  this  early 


Educates 
about  92: 

Fig.  76.  The  Prussian 

State  School  System 

Created 

Compare  with  Fig.  93  and 
note  the  difference  between  a 
European  two-class  school  sys- 
tem and  the  .\merican  demo- 
cratic educational  ladder. 


322        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

evolution  of  the  Prussian  state  school  systems  we  find  two  promi- 
nent nineteenth-century  ideas  expressing  themselves.  /The  first 
is  the  new  conception  of  the  State  as  not  merely  a  government 
organized  to  secure  national  safety  and  protection  from  invasion, 
but  rather  an  organization  of  the  people  to  promote  public  wel- 
fare and  realize  a  moral  and  political  ideal.  To  this  end  state_ 
control  of  the  whole  range  of  education,  to  enable  the  State  to 
promt)te  intellectual  and  moral  and  social  progress  along  lines  use- 
ful to  the  State,  became  a  necessity,  and  some  form  of  this  educa- 
tion, in  the  interests  of  the  public  welfare,  must  now  be  extended 
to  all.  Though  France  and  the  new  American  nation  gave  earher 
political  expression  to  this  new  conception  of  the  State,  it  was  in 
Prussia  that  the  idea  attained  its  earliest  concrete  and  for  long  its 
most  complete  realization.  Seeing  further  and  more  clearly  than 
other  nations  the  possibilities  of  education,  the  practical  workers 
of  Prussia,  and  after  them  the  other  German  States,  took  over 
education  as  a  function  of  the  State  for  the  propagation  of  the  na- 
tional ideas  and  the  promotion  of  the  national  culture. 

So  well  was  this  system  and  plan  working  that,  had  the  Imperial 
Government  not  been  so  impatient  of  that  slower  but  surer  prog- 
ress by  peaceful  means,  and  staked  all  on  a  gambler's  throw,  in 
another  half-century  the  German  nation  might  have  held  the 
world  largely  in  fee.  As  it  is,  the  results  which  the  Germans  at- 
tained by  reason  of  definite  aims  and  definite  methods  are  both  an 
encouragement  and  a  warning  to  other  nations.) 

QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

1.  Point  out  the  extent  of  the  educational  reorganization  which  resulted 
from  the  reform  work  begun  at  Halle. 

2.  How  do  you  explain  the  very  early  German  interest  in  compulsory,  school 
attendance,  when  such  was  unknown  elsewhere  in  Europe?  >  '    • 

3.  Compare  the  Prussian  Regulations  of  1737  with  what  was  common 
at  that  time  in  practice  in  the  parishes  of  the-American  Colonies.  <  »  '' 

4.  Show  the  wisdom  of  the  early  Prussian  kings  in  working  at  school  reform 
through  the  Church.     Could  they  well  have  worked  otherwise?     Why? 

5.  How  do  you  explain  such  a  slow  development  of  a  professional  teaching 
body  in  Prussia,  when  all  the  state  influences  had  for  so  long  been  favor- 
able to  educational  development?     ',  \  1 

"''^-    6.  Show  that  the  Oberschulcollegium  Board  marked  the  beginnings  of  a 
State  Ministry  for  Education  for  Prussia.     )  f  ^^ 

7.  Show  that  the  spirit  of  the  Prussian  leaders,  after  1806,  was  a  further 
expansion  of  the  German  national  feeling  which  arose  in  the  Period  of 
Enlightenment.    J  I  ^-f  __   ''^   f  ^"' 

8.  Show  that  the  reorganization  of  elementary  education,  and  the  creation 
of  the  University  of  Berlin,  were  almost  equally  important  events  for  the 
future  of  German  lands. 


NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN  PRUSSIA     323 

9.  Show  that  the  work  of  Prussia,  in  using  the  schools  for  national  ends, 
was:  (o)  in  keeping  with  the  work  of  the  French  Revolutionary  leaders, 
and  (b)  only  a  further  extension  of  the  organizing  work  done  by 
Frederick  the  Great.    >  V  */  -  3> /"^ 

10.  Show  how  the  universities  01  Germany  early  took  the  lead  of  the  univer-     _    -. 
sities  of  the  world,  and  the  influence  of  this  fact  on  national  progress.  1)  *^  ^ 

11.  Enumerate  the  new  nineteenth-century  tendencies  observable  in  the 
early  educational  organization  in  Prussia.    3  ''-    ^^— 

12.  Explain  the  marked  mid-nineteenth-century  reaction  to  educational 
development  which  set  in.     '  "2    -, 

13.  Explain  the  early  and  marked  welcome  accorded  science-study  in  Ger- 
man lands.     •^   '2 

14.  Explain  in  wh~at  ways  Prussia  attained  an  educational  leadership,  ahead 
of  other  nations,  -^y  i  6 

SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  selections,  illustrative 
of  the  contents  of  this  chapter,  are  reproduced: 

273.  Barnard:  The  Organizing  Work  of  Frederick  William  I. 

274.  Prussia:  The  School  Code  of  1763. 

275.  Prussia:  The  Silesian  School  Code  of  1765. 

276.  Austria:  The  School  Code  of  1774. 

277.  Fichte:  Addresses  to  the  German  Nation. 

278.  Mann:  The  Prussian  Elementary  Teacher  and  his  Training. 

279.  Dinter:  Prussian  Schools  and  Teachers  as  he  found  them. 

280.  Cousin:  Report  on  Education  in  Prussia. 

281.  Mann:  The  Military  Aspect  of  Prussian  Education. 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

*Alexander,  Thomas.     The  Prussian  Elementary  Schools. 
*Barnard,  Henry.     "  Public  Instruction  in  Prussia  " ;  in  American  Journal 
of  Education,  vol.  xx,  pp.  333-434. 
Barnard,  Henry.     German  Teachers  and  Educators. 
*Cassell,  Henry.     "Adolph  Diesterweg";  in  Educational  Review,  vol.  I, 
PP-  345-56.     (April,  1891.) 
Friedel,  V.  H.     The  German  School  as  a  War  Nursery. 
Lexis,  W.     A  General  View  of  the  History  and  Organization  of  Public  Edu- 
cation in  the  German  Empire. . 
*Nohle,  E.     "History  of  the  German  School  System";  in  Report  U.S. 
Commissioner  of  Education,  1897-98,  vol.  i,  pp.  3-82.    Translated  from 
Rein's  Encyclopadisches  Handbuch  der  Pddagogik. 
*Paulsen,  Fr.     German  Education,  Past  arid  Present. 
*Paulsen,  Fr.     The  German  Universities. 
*Russell,  James.     German  Higher  Schools. 
Seeley,  J.  R.     Life  and  Times  of  Stein,  vol.  I. 


NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN  FRANCE 

Lines  of  development  marked  out  by  the  Revolution.      The 

Revolution  proved  very  disastrous  to  the  old  forms  of  education 
in  France.  The  old  educational  foundations,  accumulated 
through  the  ages,  were  swept  away,  and  the  teaching  congrega- 
tions, which  had  provided  the  people  with  whatever  education 
they  had  enjoyed,  were  driven  from  the  soil.  The  ruin  of  educa- 
tional and  religious  institutions  in  Russia  under  the  recent  rule 
of  the  Bolshevists  is  perhaps  comparable  to  what  happened  in 
France.  Many  plans  were  proposed  by  the  Revolutionary  philos- 
ophers and  enthusiasts,  as  we  have  seen  (chapter  xx),  to  replace 
what  had  once  been  and  to  provide  better  than  had  once  been 
done  for  the  educational  needs  of  the  masses  of  the  people,  but 
with  results  that  were  small  in  comparison  with  the  expectations 
of  the  legislative  assemblies  which  considered  or  approved  them. 
Nevertheless,  the  directions  of  future  progress  in  educational 
organization  were  clearly  marked  out  before  Napoleon  came  to 
power,  and  the  work  which  he  did  was  largely  an  extension,  and  a 
reduction  to  working  order,  of  what  had  been  proposed  or  estab- 
lished by  the  enthusiasts  of  the  pre-revolutionary  and  revolution- 
ary periods.  At  the  time  of  the  Revolution  the  State  definitely 
took  over  the  control  of  education  from  the  Church,  and  the  work 
of  Napoleon  and  those  who  came  after  him  was  to  organize  public 
instruction  into  a  practical  state-controlled  system. 

In  effecting  this  organization,  the  preceding  discussions  of  edu- 
cation as  a  function  of  the  State  and  the  desirable  forms  of  organi- 
zation to  follow  all  bore  important  fruit,  and  the  forms  finally 
adopted  embodied  not  only  the  ideas  contained  in  the  legislation 
of  the  revolutionary  assemblies,  but  also  the  peculiar  adminis- 
trative genius  of  France  —  that  desire  for  uniformity  in  organi- 
zation and  administration  —  and  hence  stand  in  contrast  to  the 
state  educational  organizations  worked  out  about  the  same  time 
in  German  lands.  The  German  States,  as  we  have  seen,  had  for 
long  been  working  toward  state  cojitrol  of  education,  but  when 
this  was  finally  attained  they  still  permitted  a  large  degree  of 
local  initiative  and  control.    The  French,  on  the  contrary  made 


NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN  FRANCE     325 

the  transition  in  a  few  years,  and  the  system  of  state  control 
which  they  established  provided  for  uniformity,  and  for  central- 
ized supervision  and  inspection  in  the  hands  of  the  State. 

In  consequence,  Prussia  and  the  other  German  States  early 
achieY.ed  a  form  of  state  educational  organization  which  empha- 
sized local  interest  and  the  spirit  of  the  instruction,  whereas 
France  created  an  administrative  organization  which  emphasized 
central  control  and,  for  the  time,  the  fomi  rather  than  the  spirit 
of  instruction.  This  was  well  pointed  out  by  Victor  Cousin 
(R.  280),  in  contrasting  conditions  in  Prussia  with  those  existing 
in  France. 

Napoleon  begins  the  organization  of  education.  InjtygQ  Na- 
poleon became  FLrst.Consul  and  master  of  Fjance,  and  in  1804 
France,  by  vote,  changed  from  a  Republic  to  an  Empire,  with 
Napoleon  as  first  Emperor.  Until  his  banishment  to  Saint  He- 
lena (18 1 5)  he  was  master  of  France.  A  man  of  large  executive 
capacity  and  an  organizing  genius  of  great  ability,  whether  he 
turned  to  army  organization,  governmental  organization,  the 
codification  of  the  laws,  or  the  organization  of  education.  Napo- 
leon's practical  and  constructive  mind  quickly  reduced  parts  to 
their  proper  places  in  a  well-regulated  scheme.  Shortly  after  he 
became  Consul  he  took  up,  among  other  things,  the  matter  of 
educational  organization. 

In  1802  Napoleon  first  turned  his  attention  to  a  general  organ- 
ization of  public  instruction  by  directing  Count  de  Fourcroy,  a 
distinguished  chemist  who  had  been  a  teacher  in  the  Polytechnic . 
School,  and  whom  he  appointed  Director  of  Public  Instruction, 
to  draw  up,  according  to  his  ideas,  an  organizing  law  on  the  sub- 
ject. This  became  the  Law  of  i§q2j_  It  was  divided  into  nine 
chapters. 

I.  Primary  schools.  The  chapter  on  primary  schools  virtually 
reenacted  the  Law  of  1795  (R.  258  b).  Each  commune  was  re- 
quired to  furnish  a  schoolhouse  and  a  home  for  the  teaqher.  The 
teacher  was  to  be  responsible  to  local  authorities,  while  the  super- 
vision of  the  school  was  placed  under  the  prefect  of  the  Depart- 
rnent.  The  instruction  was  to  be  limited  to  reading,  writing,  and 
arithmetic,  and  the  legal  authorities  were  enjoined  "  to  watch  that 
the  teachers  did  not  carry  their  instructions  beyond  these  limits." 
The  teacher  was  to  be  paid  entirelyTrom  tuition  fees,  though  one 
fifth  of  the  pupils  were  to  be  provided  with  free  schooling.  The 
State  gave  nothing  toward  the  support  of  the  primary  schools. 


326       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

The  interest  of  Napoleon  was  not  in  primary  or  general  educar 
tion,  but  rather  in  training  pupils  for  scientific  and  technical  efl&=. 
ciency,  and  youths  of  superior  ability  for  the  professions  and  for 
executive  work  in  the  kind  of  government  he  had  imposed  upon 
France.  To  this  end  secondary  and  special  education  were  made 
particular  functions  of  the  State,  while  primary  education  was 
left  to  the  communes  to  provide  as  they  saw  fit.  They  could  pro- 
vide schools  and  the  parents  could  pay  for  the  teacher,  or  not,  as 
they  might  decide.  There  was  no  compulsion  to  enforce  the  re- 
quirement of  a  primary  school,  and  no  state  aid  to  stimulate  local 
effort  to  create  one.  In  consequence  not  many  state  primary 
schools  were  established,  and  primary  education  remained,  for 
another  generation,  in  the  hands  of  private  teachers  and  the 
Church. 

2.  Secondary  schools.  Chapters  iii  and  iv  of  the  Law  of  1802 
made  full  provision  for  two  types  of  secondary  schools  —  the 
Communal  Colleges  and  the  Lycees  —  to  replace  the  Central 
Higher  Schools  established  in  1795  (p.  284).  The  Law  of  1802 
now  replaced  them  with  two  types  of  residential  secondary  schools,  _ 
in  which  the  youth  of  the  country,  under  careful  supervision  and 
discipline,  might  prepare  for  entrance  to  the  higher  special  schoolsu 
These  fixed  the  lines  of  future  French  development  in  secondary^ 
schools. 

The  standard  secondary  school  now  became  known  as  the 
Lycee.  These  institutions  corresponded  to  the  Colleges  under  the 
old  regime,  of  which  the  College  of  Guyenne  (R.  136)  was  a  type. 
The  instruction  was  to  include  the  ancient  languages,  rhetoric, 
logic,  ethics,  belles-lettres,  mathematics,  and  physical  science, 
with  some  provision  for  additional  instruction  in  modern  lan- 
guages and  drawing.  The  funds  for  maintenance  came  from 
tuition  fees,  boarding  and  rooming  income,  and  state  scholar- 
ships, of  which  six  thousand  four  hundred  were  provided.  . 

Besides  the  Lycees,  every  school  established  by  a  municipality, 
or  kept  by  an  individual,  which  gave  instruction  in  Latin,  French, 
geography,  history,  and  mathematics  was  designated  as  a  sec- 
ondary school,  or  Communal  College.  These  institutions  usually 
offered  but  a  partial  Lycee  course,  and  were  tuition  schools,  being 
patronized  by  many  parents  whose  tastes  forbade  the  sending  of 
their  children  to  the  lower-class  primary  schools.  For  the  super- 
vision of  all  these  institutions  the  Director  General  of  Public  In---, 
struction  appointed  three  Superintendents  of  Secondary  Studies; 


NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN  FRANCE    327 

and  for  the  work  of  the  schools  he  outlined  the  courses  of  instruc- 
tion in  detail,  laid  down  the  rules  of  administration,  prepared  and 
selected  the  textbooks,  and  appointed  the  "professors." 

Special  or  Higher  Schools.    The  chapter  of  the  Law  of  i§q2^ 
on  Special  Schools  made  provision  for  the  creation  of  the  follow- 
ing special  "faculties"  or  schools  for  higher  education  for  France: 

3  medical  schools,  to  replace  the  Schools  of  Health  of  1794  (p.  283). 
10  law  schools;  increased  to  12  in  1804  (Date  of  Code  Napoleon, 

p.  518). 

4  schools  of  natural  history,  natural  philosophy,  and  chemistry. 
2  schools  of  mechanical  and  chemical  arts. 

I  mathematical  school. 

I  school  of  geography,  history,  and  political  economy. 

A  fourth  school  of  art  and  design. 

Professors  of  astronomy  for  the  observatories. 

In  1803  the  School  of  Arts  and  Trades  was  added  (R.  282),  and  in 
1804,  after  Napoleon  had  signed  the  Concordat  with  the  Pope, 
thus  restoring  the  Catholic  religion  (abolished  179J),  schools  of 
theology  were  added  to  the  above  hst. 

We  have  here,  clearly  outlined,  the  main  paths  along  which 
French  state  educational  organization  had  been  tending  and  was 
in  future  to  follow.  The  State  had  definitely  dispossessed  the 
Church  as  the  controlling  agency  in  education,  and  had  definitely 
taken  over  the  school  as  an  instrument  for  its  own  ends.  Though 
primary  education  had  been  temporarily  left  to  the  conununes, 
and  was  soon  to  be  turned  over  in  large  part  to  be  handled  by  the 
Churck  for  a  generation  longer,  the  supervision  was  to  remain 
with  the  State.  The  rniddle-class  elements  were  well  provided 
for  in  the  new  secondary  schools,  and  these  were  now  subject  to 
complete  supervision  by  the  State.  For  higher  education  groups 
of  Special  Schools,  or  Teaching  Faculties,  replaced  the  older  uni- 
versities, which  were  not  re-created  until  after  the  coming  of  the 
Third  Republic  (1871).  The  dominant  characteristics  of  the 
state  educational  system  thus  created,  aside  from  its  emphasis  on 
secondary  and  higher  education,  were  its  uniformity  and  central- 
ized control.  These  characteristics  were  further  stressed  in  the 
reorganization  of  1808,  and  have  remained  prominent  in  French 
educational  organization  ever  since. 

Creation  of  the  University  of  France.  By  1806  Napoleon  was 
ready  for  a  further  and  more  complete  organization  of  the  public 
instruction  of  the  State,  and  to  this  end  the  following  law  was 
now  enacted  (May  10,  1806) : 


328       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

Sec.  I.  There  will  be  formed,  under  the  name  of  Imperial  Univer- 
sity, a  body  exclusively  commissioned  with. teaching  and  public  educa^;, 
tion  throughout  the  Empire.  ^ 

Sec.  2.  The  members  of  this  corporation  can  contract  civil,  special, 
and  temporary  obligations. 

Sec.  3.  The  organization  of  this  corps  will  be  given  in  the  form  of  a 
law  to  the  legislative  body  in  the  session  of  1 810. 

In  1808,  without  the  formality  of  further  legislation,  Napoleon 
issued  an  Imperial  Decree  creating  the  University  of  France. 
This  was  not  only  Napoleon's  most  remarkable  educational  crea- 
tion, but  it  was  an  administrative  and  governing  organization  for 
education  so  in  harmony  with  French  spirit  and  French  govern- 
mental ideas  that  it  has  persisted  ever  since,  though  changed 
somewhat  in  form  wdth  time. 

Unlike  the  University  of  Berlin  (p.  319),  created  a  year  later, 
this  was  not  a  teaching  university  at  all,  but  instead  a  governing, 
examining,  and  disbursing  corporation,  presided  over  by  a  Grand 
Master  and  a  Council  of  twenty- six  members,  all  appointed  by 
the  Emperor.  This  Council  decided  all  matters  of  importance, 
and  exercised  supervision  and  control  over  education  of  all  kinds, 
from  the  lowest  to  the  highest,  throughout  France. 

The  Special  Higher  Schools  were  also  continued,  and  to  the  list 
given  (p.  284)  Napoleon  added  (1808)  a  Superior  Normal  School 
(R.  283)  to  train  graduates  of  the  Lycees.  for  teaching.  This 
opened  in  18 10,  with  thirty-seven  students  and  a  two-year  course 
of  instruction,  and  in  181 5  a  third  year  of  method  and  practice 
work  was  added.  With  some  varying  fortunes,  this  institution 
has  continued  to  the  present. 

The  new  interest  in  primary  education.  The  period  from  181 5 
to  1830  in  France  is  known  as  the  Restoration.  Louis  XVIII  was 
made  King  and  ruled  until  his  death  in  1824,  and  his  brother 
Charles  X  who  followed  until  deposed  by  the  Revolution  of  1830. 
Though  a  representative  of  the  old  regime  was  recalled  on  the 
abdication  of  Napoleon,  the  great  social  gains  of  the  Revolution 
were  retained.  There  was  no  odious  restoration  of  privilege  and 
absolute  monarchy.  Frenchmen  continued  to  be  equal  before 
the  law;  a  form  of  constitutional  government  was  provided;  the 
right  of  petition  was  recognized;  and  the  system  of  public  instruc- 
tion as  Napoleon  had  organized  it  continued  almost  unchanged. 
For  a  decade  at  least  there  was  less  political  reaction  in  France 
than  in  other  continental  States. 


NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN  FRANCE    329 

In  matters  of  education,  what  had  been  provided  was  retained, 
and  there  seems  (R.  284)  to  have  been  an  increasing  demand  for 
additions  and  improvements,  particularly  in  the  matter  of  pri- 
mary and  middle-class  schools,  and  a  willingness  on  the  part  of 
the  communes  to  provide  such  advantages.  Some  small  progress 
had  been  made  in  meeting  these  demands,  before  1830. 

In  1816  a  small  treasury  grant  (50,000  francs)  was  made  for 
school  books,  model  schools,  and  deserving  teachers  in  the  pri- 
mary schools,  and  in  1829  this  sum  was  increased  to  300,000 
francs.  In  1818  the '' Brothers  of  the  Christian  Schools"  were 
permitted  to  be  certificated  for  teaching  on  merely  presenting  their 
Letter  of  Obedience  from  the  head  of  their  Order,  and  in  1824 
the  cantonal  school  committees  were  remodeled  so  as  to  give  the 
bishops  and  clergy  entire  control  of  all  Catholic  primary  schools. 
In  181 7  there  were  thirty-six  Lycees,  receiving  an  annual  state 
subsidy  of  812,000  francs;  thirty  years  later  the  fifty-four  in  ex- 
istence were  receiving  1,500,000  francs.  From  1822  to  1829  the 
Higher  Normal  School  was  suppressed,  and  twelve  elementary 
normal  schools  were  created  in  its  stead.  / 

Early  work  under  the  Monarchy  of  1830.  iln  July,  1830, 
Charles^  X  attempted  to  suppress  constitutional  liberty,  and  the 
people  rose  in  revolt  and  deposed  him,  and  gave  the  crown  to  a 
new  King,  Louis-Philippe.    He  ruled  until  deposed  by  the  crea-    c^ 
tion  of  the  Second  Republic,  in  1848.    The  "Monarchy  of  1830"    ^ 
was  supported  by  the  leading  thinkers  of  the  time,  prominent 
among  whom  were  Thiers  and  Guizot,  and  one  of  the  first  affairs 
of  State  to  which  they  turned  their  attention  was  the  extension 
downward  of  the  system  of  public  instruction.    The  first  steps 
were  an  increase  of  the  state  grant  for  primary  schools  (1830)  to  a     . 
million  francs  a  year;  the  overthrow  of  the  control  by  the  priests     --     • 
of  the  cantonal  school  committees  (1830);  the  aboUtion  (1831)  of     ^ 
the  exemption  of  the  religious  orders  from  the  examinations  for  ^  -~'^. 
teaching  certificates;  and  the  creation  (1830-31)  of  thirty  new  ''  ' 
normal  schools. 

The  next  step  was  to  send  (1831)  M.  Victor  Cousin  —  Director  5^ 
of  the  restored  Higher  Normal  School  of  France  —  on  a  mission  ♦! 
*to  the  German  States,  and  in  particular  to  Prussia,  to  study  and  ^ 
report  on  the  system  of  elementary  education,  teacher  training,  and  ^ 
educational  organization  and  administration  which  had  done  <*"- 
so  much  for  its  regeneration.  So  convincing  was  Cousin's  Report  Tv>-=> 
that,  despite  bitter  national  antipathies,  it  carried  conviction 


-V- 


> 


330       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

throughout  France.  "It  demonstrated  to  the  government  and 
the  people  the  immense  superiority  of  all  the  German  States, 
even  the  most  insignificant  duchy,  over  any 
and  every  Department  of  France,  in  all 
that  concerned  institutions  of  primary  and 
secondary  education."  Cousin  pronounced 
the  school  law  of  Prussia  (R.  280)  "the 
most  comprehensive  and  perfect  legislative 
measure  regarding  primary  education" 
with  which  he  was  acquainted,  and  de- 
clared his  conviction  that  "in  the  present 
state  of  things,  a  law  concerning  primary 
education  is  indispensable  in  France." 
The  chief  question,  he  continued,  was  "how 
■^^^-  77  to  procure  a  good  one  in  a  country  where 

(1702-1867)^  there  is  a  total  absence  of  all  precedents 

and  experience  in  so  grave  a  matter." 
Cousin  then  pointed  out  the  bases,  derived  from  Prussian  experi- 
ence and  French  historical  development,  on  which  a  satisfactory 
law  could  be  framed  (R.  284  a-c) ;  the  desirability  of  local  cour 
trol  and  liberty  in  instruction  (R.  284  f-g) ;  and  strongly  recom- 
mended the  organization  of  higher  primary  schools  (a  new  crea- 
tion; first  recommended  (1792)  by  Condorcet,  p.  281)  as  well 
as  primary  schools  (R.  284  e)  to  meet  the  educational  needs  of 
the  middle  classes  of  the  population  of  France. 

The  Law  of  1833.  On  the  basis  of  Cousin's  Report  a  bill,  mak- 
ing the  maintenance  of  primary  schools  obligatory  on  every  com- 
mune ;  providing  for  higher  primary  schools  in  the  towns  and  cit- 
ies; additional  normal  schools  to  train  teachers  for  these  schools;  a 
corps  of  priipgiry-schQol  inspectors,  to  represent  the  State;  and 
normal  training  and  state  certification  required  to  teach  in  any 
primary  school,  was  prepared.  Tn  an  address  to  the  Chamber  of 
Deputies,  in  inti-oducing  the  bill  (1832),  M.  Guizot,  the  newly 
appointed  Minister  for  Public  Instruction,  set  forth  the  history  of 
primary  instruction  in  France  up  to  1832  (R.  285  a) ;  described  the 
two  grades  of  priniary  instruction  to  be  created  (R.  285  b) ;  and, 
emphasizing  Cousin's  maxim  that  "the  schoolmaster  makes  the 
school,"  dwelt  on  the  necessity  for  normal  training  and  state  cer- 
tification for  all  primary  teachers  (R.  285  c).  In  preparing  the 
bill  iTwas  decided  not  to  follow  the  revolutionary  ideas  of  free 
instruction,  by  lay  and  state  teachers,  or  to  enforce  compulsion 


NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN  FRANCE    331 

to  attend,  and  for  these  omissions  M.  Guizot,  in  his  Menwires 
(R.  286),  gives  some  very  interesting  reasons. 

The  bill  became  a  law  the  following  year,  and  is  known 
officially  as  the  Law  of  1833. 
This  Law  forms  the  founda- 
tions upon  which  the  French 
system  of  national  elemen- 
tary education  has  been  de- 
veloped, as  the  Napoleonic 
Law  of  1802  and  the  Decree 
of  1808  have  formed  the  basis 
for  secondary  education  and 
French  state  administrative 
organization.  A  primaiy 
school  was  to  be  established 
in  ever}^  cornmune,  which  was 
to  provide  the  building,  pay  a 
fixed  minimum  salary-  to  the 
teacher,  and  where  able  main- 
tain the  school.  The  State  re- 
served the  right  to  fix  the  pay 
of  the  teacher,  and  even  to 
approve  his  appointment.  A 
tuition  fee  was  to  be  paid 
for  attendance,  but  those  who 
could  not  pay  were  to  be  pro- 
vided with  free  places.  The 
primary  schools  were  to  give 

instruction  in  reading,  writing,  arithmetic,  the  weights  and  meas- 
ures, the  French  language,  and  morals  and  religion.  The  higher 
primary  schools  were  to  build  on  these  subjects,  and  to  ofiFer  in- 
struction in  geometry  and  its  applications,  linear  drawing,  sur- 
veying, physical  science,  natural  history,  history,  geography,  and 
music,  and  were  to  emphasize  instruction  in  ''the  history  and 
geography  of  France,  and  in  the  elements  of  science,  as  they  apply 
it  every  day  in  the  office,  the  workshop,  and  the  field."  These 
latter  were  the  Biirgerschulen,  recommended  by  Cousin  (R.  284  e) 
on  the  basis  of  his  study  of  Prussian  education. 

In  sending  out  a  copy  of  the  Law  to  the  primary  teachers  of 
France,  M.  Gujzot  enclosed  a  personal  letter  to  each,  informing 
him  as  to  what  the  government  expected  of  him  in  the  new  work 


Elementary 


Secondary 


Fig.  78.  Outline  of  the  Main 

Features  of  the  French 

State  School  System 


332        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

(R.  287).  During  the  four  years  that  M.  Guizot  remained  Min- 
ister of  PubHc  Instruction  he  rendered  a  remarkable  service, 
well  described  by  Matthew  Arnold  (R.  288),  in  awakening  his 
countrymen  to  the  new  problem  of  popular  education  then 
before  them. 

The  results  under  the  Law  of  1833  were  large,  and  the  subse- 
quent legislation  under  the  monarchy  of  .1830  was  important. 
For  the  first  time  in  French  history  an  earnest  effort  was  made  to 
provide  education  suited  to  the  needs  of  the  great  mass  of  the  peo- 
ple, and  the  marked  devjelopment  of  schools  which  ensued  showed 
how  eagerly  they  embraced  the  opportunities  offered  their  chil- 
dren, though  the  schooling  was  neither  compulsory  nor  gratuir 
tous. 

The  period  from  1848  to  1870  in  France  was  a  period  of  rniddle;; 
class^rule,  and  reaction  in  education  as  in  government,  and  no 
real  progress  in  advjajicing  education  was  made.  Instead  religious 
schools  were  favored,  some  of  the  earlier  leaders  were  sent  into 
exilcj  and  private  schools  were  given  full  freedom  to  compete 
with  the  state  schools. 

Religious,  instruction  prospered  under  the  Second  Empire,  and 
the  state  primary  schools  lost  in  importance.  The  Lycees  con- 
tinued largely  as  classical  institutions,  though  after  1865  the 
crowding  of  the  rismg  sciences  began  to  dispute  the  supremacy  of 
classical  studies.  There  were,  however,  many  voices  of  discon- 
tent,  particularly  from  exiled  teachers  (R.  289) ,  and  the  way  was 
rapidly  being  prepared  for  the  creation  of  a  stronger  and  betjter 
state  school  system  as  soon  as  political  conditions  were  propitious. 

Revolutionary  ideals  at  last  realized.  With  the  creation  of  the 
Third  Republic,  in  1820^  a  change  from  the  old  conditions  and  qld_ 
attitudes  took  place.  Up  to  about  1879  the  new  government  was 
in  the  control  of  those  who  were  at  heart  sympathetic  with  the 
old  conditions,  but  were  forced  to  accept  the  new;  from  1879  to 
1890  was  a  transition  period;  and  since  1890  the  Republic  has 
grown  steadily  in  strength  and  regained  its  position  among  the 
great  pgwers  of  the  world.  The  first  few  years  of  the  new  Repub- 
lic  were  devoted  to  paying  the  Prussian  indemnity  and  clearing 
the  soil  of  France  of  German  armies,  but,  after  about  1875,  edu- 
cation becamF  a  great  national  interest  among  the  leaders  of 
France.  France  saw,  somewhat  as  did  Prussia  after  1806,  the 
necessity  for  creating  a  strong  state  system  of  primary,  secondary, 
and  higher  schools  to  train  the  youth  of  the  land  in  the  principles 


NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN  FRANCE   333 

of  the  Republic,  strengthen  the  national  spirit,  advance  the  wel- 
fare of  the  State,  and  protect  it  from  dangers  both  within  and 
without. 

Millions  were  put  into  the  building  of  schoolhouses  (1878-88); 
new  normal  schools  were  estabUshed;  a  normal  school  for  women 
was  created  in  each  of  the  eighty-seven  departments  of  France; 
the  academic  and  superior  councils  of  public  instruction  were 
reorganized  to  eliminate  clerical  influences  (1881);  religious  in- 
struction was  replaced  by  moral  and  civic  instruction  (R.  290) ; 
and  clerical  "Letters  of  Obedience"  were  no  longer  accepted, 
and  all  teachers  were  required  to  be  certificated  by  the  State. 
The  Law  of  1881,  eliminating  instruction  in  religion  from  the 
elementary  schools,  was  followed,  in  1886,  by  a  law  providing  for 
the  gradual  replacement  of  clerical  by  lay  teachers.  In  1904, 
the  teaching  congregations  of  France  were  suppressed.  All  ele- 
mentary education  now  became  public,  free,  compulsory,  and 
seoilar,  and  teachers  were  required  to  be  neutral  in  religious 
matters. 

Since  187 1,  also,  technical  and  scientific  education  has  been 
emphasized ;  the  primary  and  superior-primary  schools  have  been 
made  free  (i88i)(and  compulsory  (1882);;  classes  for  adults  have 
been  begun  generally;  the  state  aid  for  schools  has  been  very 
greatly  increased ;  lycees  and  colleges  for  women  have  been  created 
(1880);  the  lycees  modernized  in  their  instruction;  and  the  rc;^ 
organization  and  reestablishment  of  a  series  of  fifteen  state  uni- 
versities of  a  modern  type,  begun  in  1885,  was  completed  in  1896. 
The  reorganization  and  expansion  oFeducation  in  France  since 
i87^is  a  wonderful  example  of  republican  interest  and  energy, 
and  is  along  entirely  different  lines  from  those  followed,  since  the 
same  date,  in  German  lands. 

After  the  lapse  of  nearly  a  century  we  now  see  the  French 
Revolutionary  ideas  of  gratuity,  obligation,  and  secularization 
finally  put  into  effect,  and  the  state  system  of  public  instruction 
outlined  by  Condorcet  (p.  281),  in  1792,  at  last  an  accomplished 
fact. 

QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

1.  Show  how  the  Revolution  marked  out  the  lines  of  future  educational 
evolution  for  France. 

2.  Explain  why  France  and  Italy  evolved  a  school  system  so  much  more 
centralized  than  did  other  European  nations. 

3.  Explain  Napoleon's  lack  of  interest  in  primary  education,  in  view  of 
the  needs  of  France  in  his  day. 


334       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

4.  Show  that  Napoleon  was  right,  time  and  circumstances  considered,  in 
placing  the  state  emphasis  on  the  types  of  education  he  favored. 

5.  Explain  why  middle-class  education  should  have  received  such  special 
attention  in  Cousin's  Report,  and  in  the  Law  of  1833. 

6.  Was  the  course  of  instruction  provided  for  the  primary  schools  in  1833, 
times  and  needs  considered,  a  liberal  one,  or  otherwise?    Why? 

7.  Compare  the  1833  and  the  1850  courses. 

8.  Explain  why  all  forms  of  education  in  France  should  have  experienced 
such  a  marked  expansion  and  development  after  1875. 

9.  Explain  why  great  military  disasters,  for  the  past  150  years,  have  nearly 
always  resulted  in  national  educational  reorganization. 

10.  Appraise  the  work  and  the  permanent  influence  of  Napoleon. 

SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  selections  are  re- 
produced: 

282.  Le  Brun:  Founding  of  the  School  of  Arts  and  Trades. 

283.  Jourdain:  Refounding  of  the  Superior  Normal  School. 

284.  Cousin:  Recommendations  for  Education  in  France. 

285.  Guizot:  Address  on  the  Law  of  1833. 

286.  Guizot:  Principles  underlying  the  Law  of  1833. 

287.  Guizot:  Letter  to  the  Primary  Teachers  of  France. 

288.  Arnold:  Guizot's  Work  as  Minister  of  Public  Instruction. 

289.  Quinet:  A  Lay  School  for  a  Lay  Society. 

290.  Ferry:  Moral  and  Civic  Instruction  replaces  the  Religious. 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

Arnold,  Matthew.    Popular  Education  in  France. 
*Arnold,  Matthew.    Schools  and  Universities  on  the  Continent. 
*Barnard,  Henry.     National  Education  in  Europe. 

Barnard,  Henry.     American  Journal  of  Education,  vol.  XX. 

Compayre,  G.    History  of  Pedagogy,  chapter  xxi. 
*Farrington,  Fr.  E.     The  Public  Primary  School  System  of  France. 
*Farrington,  Fr.  E.     French  Secondary  Schools. 

Guizot,  F.  P.  G.  Memoires,  Extracts  from,  covering  work  as  Minister 
of  Public  Instruction,  1832-37,  in  Barnard's  American  Journal  of 
Education,  vol.  xi,  pp.  254-81,  357-99. 


CHAPTER  XXIV 

THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN 

ENGLAND 

I.  THE  CHARITABLE-VOLUNTARY  BEGINNINGS 

English  progress  a  slow  but  peaceful  evolution.  The  begin- 
nings of  national  educational  organization  in  England  were 
neither  so  simple  nor  so  easy  as  in  the  other  lands  we  have  de- 
scribed. So  far  this  was  in  part  due  to  the  long-established  idea, 
on  the  part  of  the  small  ruling  class,  that  education  was  no  busi- 
ness of  the  State;  in  part  to  the  deeply  ingrained  conception  as  to 
the  religious  purpose  of  all  instruction;  in  part  to  the  fact  that  the 
controlling  upper  classes  had  for  long  been  in  possession  of  an 
educational  system  which  rendered  satisfactory  service  in  prepar- 
ing leaders  for  both  Church  and  State;  and  in  part  —  probably 
in  large  part  —  to  the  fact  that  national  evolution  in  England, 
since  the  time  of  the  Civil  War  (1642-49)  has  been  a  slow  and 
peaceful  growth,  though  accompanied  by  much  hard  thinking  and 
vigorous  parliamentary  fighting.  Since  the  Reformation  (1534- 
39)  and  the  Puritan  uprising  led  by  Cromwell  (1642-49),  no  civil 
strife  has  convulsed  the  land,  destroyed  old  institutions,  and 
forced  rapid  changes  in  old  established  practices.  Neither  has 
the  country  been  in  danger  from  foreign  invasion  since  that  mem- 
orable week  in  July,  1588,  when  Drake  destroyed  the  Spanish 
Armada  and  made  the  future  of  England  as  a  world  power 
secure. 

English  educational  evolution  has  in  consequence  been  slow, 
and  changes  and  progress  have  come  only  in  response  to  much 
pressure,  and  usually  as  a  reluctant  concession  to  avoid  more  seri- 
ous trouble.  A  strong  English  characteristic  has  been  the  ability 
to  argue  rather  than  fight  out  questions  of  national  policy;  to  ex- 
hihit  marked  tolerance  of  the  opinions  of  others  during  the  dis- 
cussion; and  finally  to  recognize  enough  of  the  proponents'  point 
of  view  to  be  wilhng  to  make  concessions  sufiicient  to  arrive  at 
an  agreement.  This  has  resulted  in  a  slow  but  a  peaceful  evo- 
lution, and  this  slow  and  peaceful  evolution  has  for  long  been 
the  dominant  characteristic  of  the  pohtical,  social,  and  educa- 
tional progress  of  the  English  people.    The  whole  history  of 


336       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

the  two  centuries  of  evolution  toward  a  national  system  of  edu- 
cation is  a  splendid  illustration  of  this  essentially  English  char- 
acteristic. 

Eighteenth-century  educational  efforts.  England,  it  will  be 
remembered  (chapter  xix,  §  iii),  had  early  made  marked  progress 
in  both  political  and  religious  liberty.  Ahead  of  any  other  people 
we  find  there  the  beginnings  of  democratic  liberty,  popular  en- 
lightenment, freedom  of  the  press,  religious  toleration,  social  re- 
form, and  scientific  and  industrial  progress.  All  these  influences 
awakened  in  England,  earlier  than  in  any  other  European  nation, 
a  rather  general  desire  to  be  able  to  read  (R.  170),  and  by  the 
opening  of  the  eighteenth  century  we  find  the  beginnings  of  a  char- 
itable and  philanthropic  movement  on  the  part  of  the  churches 
and  the  upppr  classes  to  extend  a  knowledge  of  the  elements  of 
learning  to  the  poorer  classes  of  the  population. 
y  The  Charity-School  system.  Most  important  of  all  was  the 
^  organization,  by  groups  of  individuals  (R.  237)  and  by  Societies 
(S.P.C.K.;  p.  240)  formed  for  the  purpose,  and  maintained  by 
subscription  (R.  240),  collections  (R.  291),  and  foundation  in- 
comes, of  an  extensive  and  well-organized  system  of  Charity- 
Schools  (p.  240).  The  "Society  for  the  Promotion  of  Christian 
Knowledge"  dates  from  the  year  1699,  and  the  ''Society  for  the 
Propagation  of  the  Gospel  in  Foreign  Parts"  from  1701.  The 
first  worked  at  home,  and  the  second  in  the  overseas  colonies. 
Both  did  much  to  provide  schools  for  poor  boys  and  girls,  furnish- 
ing them  with  clothing  and  instruction  (R.  292),  and  training 
them  in  reading,  writing,  spelling,  counting,  cleanliness,  proper 
behavior,  sewing  and  knitting  (girls),  and  in  "the  Rules  and 
Principles  of  the  Christian  Religion  as  professed  and  taught  in 
the  Church  of  England ' '  (R.  238  b) .  The  Charity-School  idea  was 
in  a  sense  an  application  of  the  Joint-stock-company  principle  to 
the  organization  and  maintenance  of  an  extensive  system  of 
schools  for  the  education  of  the  children  of  the  poor.  The  upper . 
classes  now  united  to  provide,  as  part  of  a  great  organized  char- 
ity and  under  carefully  selected  teachers  (R.  238  a) ,  for  the  more 
promising  children  of  their  poorer  neighbors,  the  elements  of  that 
education  which  they  themselves  had  enjoyed. 

The  movement  spread  rapidly  over  England  (p.  241),  and  soon 
developed  into  a  great  national  effort  to  raise  the  level  of  intelli- 
gence of  the  masses  of  the  English  people.  Thousands  of  persons 
gave  their  services  as  directors,  organizers,  and  teachers.     Trav- 


NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN  ENGLAND     337 

eUng  superintendents  were  employed.     A  rudimentary  form  of 
teacher-training  was  begun. 

UnUke  the  German  States,  where  the  State  and  the  Church  and 
the  school  had  all  worked  together  from  the  days  of  the  Reforma- 
tion on,  the  EngUsh  had  never  known  such  a  conception.  The 
efforts,  though,  of  the  educated  few,  in  the  eighteenth  and  early 
nineteenth  centuries,  to  extend  the  elements  of  learning,  order, 
piety,  cleanliness,  and  proper  behavior  to  the  children  of  the 
masses,  formed  an  important  substitute  for  the  action  by  the 
Church-State  which  was  so  characteristic  a  feature  of  Teutonic 
lands. 

We  see  in  these  eighteenth-century  efforts  the  origin  of  what 
became  known  in  England  as  "the  voluntary  system,"  and  upon 
this  voluntary  support  of  education  —  private,  parochial,  chari- 
table —  the  English  people  for  long  relied. 
er  The  Sunday-School  movement.  One  other  voluntary  eight- 
''r  eenth-century  movement  of  importance  in  the  history  of  English 
educational  development  should  be  mentioned  here,  as  it  formed 
the  connecting  link  between  the  parochial-charity-school  move- 
ment of  the  eighteenth  century  and  the  philanthropic  period  of 
the  educational  reformers  of  the  early  nineteenth.  This  was  the 
Sunday-School  movement,  first  tried  by  John  Wesley  in  Savan- 
nah, in  1737,  but  not  introduced  into  England  until  1763.  The 
idea  amounted  to  Uttle,  though,  until  practically  worked  out  anew 
(i^So)  by  Robert  Raikes,  a  printer  of  Gloucester,  and  described 
by  him  (1^83)  in  his  Gloticester  Journal  (R.  293),  after  he  had  ex- 
perimented with  it  for  three  years.  His  printed  description  of 
the  Sunday-School  idea  gave  a  national  impulse  to  the  move- 
ment, and  Sunday  Schools  were  soon  established  all  over  England 
to  take  children  off  the  streets  on  Sunday  and  provide  them  with 
some_/orm  of  secxdar  and  religious  instruction. 

The  rapid  growth  of  population  in  the  towns,  following  the 
beginnings  of  factory  hfe  (p.  245),  had  created  new  social  and 
economic  problems,  and  the  neglect  of  children  in  the  manufac- 
turing towns  had  shocked  many  thinking  persons.  The  way 
in  which  parents  and  children,  freed  from  hard  labor  in  the  fac- 
tories on  Sundays,  abandoned  themselves  to  vice,  drunkenness, 
and  profanity  caused  many,  among  them  Raikes  himself  (R.  293), 
to  inquire  if  "something  could  not  be  done"  to  turn  into  re- 
spectable men  and  women  "  the  little  heathen  of  the  neighbor- 
hood."   The  Sunday  School  was  his  answer,  and  the  answer  of 


338        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

many  all  over  England.  The  moral  and  religious  influence  of 
these  schools  was  important,  and  the  instruction  in  reading  and 
writing,  meager  as  it  was,  filled  a  real  need 
of  the  time. 

Other  voluntary  schools;  "Ragged 
Schools."  The  Charity  Schools  and  the 
Sunday  Schools  were  the  two  most  conspic- 
uous of  the  voluntary-organization  type  of 
undertakings  for  providing  the  poor  children 
of  England  with  the  elements  of  secular  and 
religious  education.  Many  other  organiza- 
tions of  an  educational  and  charitable  na- 
ture, aided  also  by  many  individual  efforts, 
too  numerous  to  mention,  were  formed  with 
the  same  charitable  and  humanitarian  end 
in  view.  Others,  similar  in  type,  charged 
a  small  fee,  and  hence  were  of  the  priv- 
ate-adventure type.  Sunday  Schools,  day 
schools,  evening  schools,  children's  churches, 
bands  of  hope,  clothing  clubs,  messenger  bri- 
gades, shoeblack  brigades,  orphans'  schools, 
reformatory  schools,  industrial  schools,  rag- 
ged schools  —  these  were  some  of  the  typ.es 
that  arose.  Upon  many  such  forms  of  ir- 
regular schools  England  depended  before 
the  days  of  national  organization. 


Fig.  79.  A  Ragged- 
School  Pupil 
(From  a  photograph  of 
a  boy  on  entering  the 
school;  later  changed 
into  a  respectable  trades- 
man.   From  Guthrie) 


II.  THE  PERIOD  OF  PHILANTHROPIC  EFFORT    (1800-33) 

Origin  of  mutual  or  monitorial  instruction.  In  1797  Dr.  An- 
drew Bell,  a  clergyman  in  the  Established  Church,  published  the 
results  of  his  experiment  in  the  use  of  monitors  in  India.  The 
idea  attracted  attention,  and  the  plan  was  successfully  introduced 
into  a  number  of  charity-schools.  About  the  same  time  (1798)  a 
young  Quaker  schoolmaster,  Joseph  Lancaster  by  name,  was  led 
independently  to  a  similar  discovery  of  the  advantages  of  using 
monitors,  by  reason  of  his  needing  assistance  in  his  school  and  be- 
ing too  poor  to  pay  for  additional  teachers.  In  1803  he  pub- 
lished an  account  of  his  plan.  The  two  plans  were  quite  similar, 
attracted  attention  from  the  first,  and  schools  formed  after  one  or 
the  other  of  the  plans  were  soon  organized  all  over  England. 

The  mutual  instruction  idea  spread  to  other  lands  —  France, 


NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN  ENGLAND     339 

Belgium,  Holland,  Denmaxk  —  and  seems  to  have  been  tried 
even  in  German  lands.  In  France  and  Belgium  it  was  experi- 
mented with  for  a  time  because  of  its  cheapness,  but  was  soon 
discarded  because  of  its  defects.     In  Teutonic  lands,  where  the 


\^ 


Rev.  Andrew  Bell  (1753-1832)       Joseph  Lancaster  (1778-1838) 
Fig.  80.  The  Creators  of  the  Monitorial  System 


much  better  Pestalozzian  ideas  had  become  established,  the 
monitorial  system  made  practically  no  headway.  It  was  in  the 
United  States,  of  all  countries  outside  of  England,  that  the  idea 

u_  met  with  most  ready  acceptance, 

^^  The  system  of  mutual  or  monitorial  instruction.  The  great 
merit,  aside  from  being  cheap,  of  the  mutual  or  monitorial  system 
of  instruction  lay  in  that  it  represented  a  marked  advance  in 
school  organization  over  the  older  individual  method  of  instruc- 
tion, with  its  accompanying  waste  of  time  and  schoolroom  dis- 
order. Under  the  individual  method  only  a  small  number  of 
pupils  could  be  placed  under  the  control  of  one  teacher,  and  the 
expense  for  such  instruction  made  general  education  almost  pro- 
hibitive. Pestalozzi,  to  be  sure,  had  worked  out  in  Switzerland 
the  modem  class-system  of  instruction,  and  following  develop- 
mental lines  in  teaching,  but  of  this  the  English  were  not  only 
ignorant,  but  it  called  for  a  degree  of  pedagogical  skill  which  their 
teachers  did  not  then  possess.  Bell  and  Lancaster  now  evolved 
a  plan  whereby  one  teacher,  assisted  by  a  munber  of  the  brighter 
pupils  whom  they  designated  as  monitors,  could  teach  from  two 


340       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


4:3^  <u 


hundred  to  a  thousand  pupils  in  one  school  (R.  297).  The  pic- 
ture of  Lancaster's  London  school  (Figure  81)  shows  365  pupils 
seated.  The  pupils  were  sorted  into  rows,  and  to  each  row  was 
assigned  a  clever  boy  (monitor)  to  act  as  an  assistant  teacher. 


NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN  ENGLAND.   341 

A.  common  number  for  each  monitor  to  look  after  was  ten.  The 
teacher  first  taught  these  monitors  a  lesson  from  a  printed  card, 
and  then  each  monitor  took  his  row  to  a  "  station  "  about  the  wall 
and  proceeded  to  teach  the  other  boys  what  he  had  just  learned. 
At  first  used  only  for  teaching  reading  and  the  Catechism,  the  plan 
was  soon  extended  to  the  teaching  of  writing,  arithmetic,  and 
spelling,  and  later  on  to  instruction  in  higher  branches.  The  sys- 
tem was  very  popular  from  about  18.10  to  1830,  but  by  1840  its 
popularity  had  waned. 

Such  schools  were  naturally  highly  organized,  the  organization 
being  largely  mechanical  (R.  298).    Lancaster,  in  particular,  was 


Fig.  82.  Monitors  teaching  Reading  at  "Stations" 

Three  "drafts"  of  ten  each,  with  their  toes  to  the  semicircles  painted  on 
the  floor,  are  being  taught  by  monitors  from  lessons  suspended  on  the  wall. 

an  organizing  genius.  The  Manuals  of  Instruction  gave  complete 
directions  for  the  organization  and  management  of  monitorial 
schools,  the  details  of  recitation  work,  use  of  apparatus,  ord^r, 
position  of  pupils  at  their  work,  and  classification  being  minutely 
laid  down.  By  carefully  studying  and  following  these  directions 
any  reasonably  intelligent  person  could  soon  learn  to  become  a 
successful  teacher  in  a  monitorial  school. 

The  schools,  mechanical  as  they  now  seem,  marked  a  great  im- 
provement over  the  individual  method  upon  which  schoolmasters 
for  centuries  had  wasted  so  much  of  their  own  and  their  pupils' 
time.  In  place  of  earlier  idleness,  inattention,  and  disorder,  Bell 
and  Lancaster  introduced  activity,  emulation,  order,  and  a  kind 
of  military  discipline  which  was  of  much  value  to  the  type  of 
children  attending  these  schools.  Lancaster's  biographer,  Sal- 
mon, has  written  of  the  system  that  so  thoroughly  was  the  instruc- 
tion worked  out  that  the  teacher  had  only  to  organize,  oversee, 
reward,  punish,  and  inspire: 

When  a  child  was  admitted  a  monitcr  assigned  him  his  class;  while 


342    •   A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

he  remained,  a  monitor  taught  him  (with  nine  other  pupils) ;  when  he 
was  absent,  one  monitor  ascertained  the  fact,  and  another  found  out 
the  reason;  a  monitor  examined  him  periodically,  and,  when  he  made 
progress,  a  monitor  promoted  him;  a  monitor  ruled  the  writing  paper; 
a  monitor  had  charge  of  slates  and  books;  and  a  monitor-general  looked 
after  all  the  other  monitors.  Every  monitor  wore  a  leather  ticket, 
gilded  and  lettered,  "  Monitor  of  the  First  Class,"  "  Reading  Monitor 
of  the  Second  Class,"  etc. 

Value  of  the  system  in  awakening  interest.  The  monitorial 
system  of  instruction,  coming  at  the  time  it  did,  exerted  a  very 
important  influence  in  awakening  interest  in  and  a  sentiment  for 
schools.  It  increased  the  number  of  people  who  possessed  the 
elements  of  an  education;  made  schools  much  more  talked  about; 
and  aroused  thought  and  provoked  discussion  on  the  question  of 
education.  It  did  much  toward  making  people  see  the  advan- 
tages of  a  certain  amount  of  schooling,  and  be  willing  to  contrib- 
ute to  its  support.  Under  the  plans  previously  in  use  education 
had  been  a  slow  and  an  expensive  process,  because  it  had  to  be 
carried  on  by  the  individual  method  of  instruction,  and  in  quite 
small  groups.  Under  this  new  plan  it  was  now  possible  for  one 
teacher  to  instruct  300,  400,  500,  or  more  pupils  in  a  single  room, 
and  to  do  it  with  much  better  results  in  both  learning  and  disci- 
pline than  the  old  type  of  schoolmaster  had  achieved. 

All  at  once,  comparatively,  a  new  system  had  been  introduced 
which  not  only  improved  and  popularized,  but  tremendously 
cheapened  education.  Lancaster,  in  his  Improvements  in  Educa- 
tion, gave  the  annual  cost  of  schooling  under  his  system  as  only 
seven  shillings  sixpence  ($1.80)  per  pupil,  and  this  was  later  de- 
creased to  four  shillings  fivepence  ($1.06)  as  the  school  was  in- 
creased to  accommodate  a  thousand  pupils.  Under  the  Bell  sys- 
tem the  yearly  cost  per  pupil,  in  a  school  of  five  hundred,  was  only 
four  shillings  twopence  ($1.00),  in  1814.  In  the  United  States, 
Lancastrian  schools  cost  from  $1.22  per  pupil  in  New  York,  in 
1822,  up  to  $3.00  and  $4.00  later  on.  To  prepare  skilled  mas- 
ters and  mistresses  for  the  schools  —  girls  were  provided  for  in 
many  places  — training  or  model  schools  were  organized  by  both 
the  national  societies,  and  these  represent  the  beginnings  of  nor- 
mal-school training  in  England. 
7y  Infant  Schools.  Another  type  of  school  which  became  of  much 
importance  in  England,  and  spread  to  other  lands,  was  the  Infant 
School.  This  owed  its  origin  to  Robert  Owen,  proprietor  of 
the  cotton  mills  at  New  Lanark,  Scotland.    Being  of  a  phil- 


NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN  ENGLAND    343 

anthropic  turn  of  mind,  and  believing  that  man  was  entirely 
the  product  of  circumstance  and  environment,  he  held  that  it 

was  not  possible. to  begin  too  early  in  im-  ^^^^^ 

planting  right  habits  and  forming  char-  ^^^^^ 

s^T.    Poverty  and  crime,  he  believed,  Wm^'-.  "  m. 

were  results  of  errors  in  the  various  sys-  ^Kf^^^lP 

tems  of  education  and  government.     So  ifUL^  tr 

plastic  was  child  nature,  that  society  would  J^^^^^ 

be   able  to  mould   itself  "into   the  very  .^■^l^/j^ 

image   of    rational   wishes    and    desires."  f^Sg^^^JM^^. 

That  "the  infants  of  any  one  class  in  the  '^BM  ]k   IIHR 

world  may  be  readily  formed  into  men  <^^f    |  f      ^mm 

of  any  other  class,"  was  a  fundamental  ';(1     \  j        •ff  |\ 

When  he  took  charge  of  the  mills  at  New  Fig-  83 

Lanark  (i  799)  he  found  the  usual  wretched  Robert  Owen 

social  conditions  of  the  time.     Children  ^  ^ 

of  five,  six,  and  seven  years  were  bound  out  to  the  factory  as 
api^rentices  (R.  242)  for  a  period  of  nine  years.  They  worked  as 
apprenitices  and  helpers  in  the  factories  twelve  to  thirteen  hours 
aday,  and  at  early  manhood  were  turned  free  to  join  the  ignorant 
mass  of  the  population.  Owen  sought  to  remedy  this  condition. 
He  accordingly  opened  schools  which  children  might  enter  at 
three  years  of  age,  receiving  them  into  the  schools  almost  as  soon 
as  they  were  able  to  walk,  and  caring  for  them  while  their  parents 
were  at  work.  Children  under  ten  he  forbade  to  work  in  the  mills^ 
and  for  these  he  provided  schools.  The  instruction  for  the  chil- 
dren younger  than  six  was  to  be  "whatever  might  be  supposed 
useful  that  they  could  understand,"  and  much  was  made  of  sing- 
ing, dancing,  and  play.  Moral  instruction  was  made  a  prominent 
feature.  By  i8i4Tiis_work  and  his  schools  had  become  famous. 
In  18 1 7  he  published  a  plan  for  the  organization  of  such  industrial 
communities  as  he  conducted.  In  1818  he  visited  Switzerland, 
and  saw  Pestalozzi  and  Fellenberg. 

Unlike  the  monitorial  schools,  the  Infant  Schools  were  based 
on  the  idea  of  small-group  work,  and  were  usually  conducted  in 
hamiony  with  the  new  psychological  conceptions  of  instruction 
which  had  been  worked  out  by  Pestalozzi,  and  had  by  that  time 
begun  to  be  introduced  into  England.  The  Infant-School  idea 
came  at  an  opportune  time,  as  the  defects  of  the  mechanical  Lan- 
castrian instruction  were  becoming  evident  and  its  popularity 


344       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

was  waning.  It  gave  a  new  and  a  somewhat  deeper  philosophical 
interpretation  of  the  educational  process,  created  a  stronger  de- 
mand than  had  before  been  known  for  trained  teachers,  estab- 
lished a  preference  for  women  teachers  for  primary  work,  and 
tended  to  give  a  new  dignity  to  teaching  and  school  work  by 
revealing  something  of  a  psychological  basis  for  the  instruction 
of  little  children.  It  also  contributed  its  share  toward  awakening 
a  sentiment  for  national  action. 

Work  of  the  educational  societies.  The  work  of  the  voluntary 
and  philanthropic  educational  societies  in  establishing  schools  and 
providing  teachers  and  instruction  before  the  days  of  national 
schools  was  enormous.  Though  the  State  did  nothing  before 
1833,  and  little  before  1870,  the  work  of  the  educational  societies 
was  large  and  important.  After  about  1820-25  ^^e  rising  interest 
in  elementary  education  expressed  itself  in  the  formation  of  many 
additional  societies.  Some  of  these  were  formed  to  found  and 
support  schools,  and  some  engaged  primarily  in  the  work  of  prop- 
aganda in  an  effort  to  secure  some  national  action. 

yiV^rG-^II-  THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  NATIONAL  EDUCATION 

^  The  parliamentary  struggle.  During  the  whole  of  the  eight- 
eenth century  Parliament  had  enacted  no  legislation  relating  to 
elementary  education,  aside  from  the  one  Act  of  1767  for  the 
education  of  pauper  children  in  London,  and  the  freeing  of  ele- 
mentary schools.  Dissenters,  and  Catholics,  from  inhibitions  as 
to  teaching.  In  the  nineteenth  century  this  attitude  was  to  be 
changed,  though  slowly,  and  after  three  quarters  of  a  century  of 
struggle  the  beginnings  of  national  education  were  finally  to  be 
made  for  England,  as  they  had  by  then  for  every  other  great 
nation.  In  1870  the  "  no-business-of-the-State  "  attitude  toward 
the  education  of  the  people,  which  had  persisted  from  the  days  of 
the  great  Elizabeth,  was  finally  and  permanently  changed.  The 
legislative  battle  began  with  the  first  Factory  Act  of  1802,  Whit- 
bread's  Parochial  Schools  Bill  of  1807,  and  Brougham's  first 
Parliamentary  Committee  of  Inquiry  of  1816  (R.  291);  it  finally 
culminated  with  the  reform  of  the  old  endowed  Grammar  Schools 
by  the  Act  of  1869,  the  enactment  of  the  Elementary  Education 
Act  of  1870  (R.  304),  and  the  Act  of  1871  freeing  instruction 
in  the  universities  from  religious  restrictions  (R.  305).  The  first 
of  these  enactments  declared  clearly  the  right  of  the  State  to 
inquire  into,  reorganize,  and  redirect  the  age-old  educational 


NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN  ENGLAND    345 


foundations  for  secondary  education;/ the  second  made  the 
definite  though  tardy  beginnings  of  a  national  systeih  of  elemen- 
tary education  for  England;  and  the  third  opened  up  a  university 
career  to  the  whole  nation.  The  agitation  and  conflict  of  ideas 
was  long  drawn  out,  and  need  not  be  traced  in  detail. 

The  leaders  in  the  conflict.  The  main  leader  in  the  parlia- 
mentary struggle  to  establish  national  education,  from  the  death 
of  Whitbread,  in  181 5,  to  about  1835,  was  Henry,  afterwards 
Lord  Brougham.  He  was  aided  by  such  men  as  Blackstone,  and 
Bentham  and  his  followers,  and,  after  about  1837,  by  such  men 
as  Dickens,  Carlyle,  Macaulay,  and  John  Stuart  Mill.  Dickens, 
by  his  descriptions,  helped  materially  to  create  a  Sentiment  favof^ 
able  to  education,  as  a  right  of  the  people  rather  than  a  charity. 
He  stood  strongly  for  a  compulsory  and  non-sectarian  state  sys- 
temjif-jeducation  that  would  transform  the  children  ^Tiis  da^ 
into  generous,  self-respecting,  and  intelligent  men  and  women. 
Carlyle  saw  in  education  a  cure  for  social  evils,  and  held  that  one 
of  the  first  fimctions  of  government  was  to  impart  the  gift  of 
thinking  to  its  future  citizens. 

Brougham  was  untiring  in  his  efforts  for  popular  education, 
and  some  idea  as  to  the  interest  he  awakened  may  be  inferred 
from  the  fact  that  his  Observations  on  the 
Education  of  the  People,  published  in  1825, 
went  through  twenty  editions  the  first 
year.  He  introduced  bills,  secured  com- 
mittees of  inquir}^  made  addresses,  and 
used  his  pen  in  behalf  of  the  education  of 
the  people.  His  behef  in  the  power  of 
education  to  improve  a  people  was  very 
larger~Waming  the  "Lawgivers  of  Eng- 
land" to  take  heed,  he  once  said: 

Let  the  soldier  be  abroad,  if  he  will;  he  can 
do  nothing  in  this  age.  There  is  another  per- 
sonage abroad,  a  person  less  imposing — in  the 
eye  of  some  insignificant.  The  Schoolmaster 
is  abroad,  and  I  trust  him,  armed  with  his 
primer,  against  the  soldier  in  full  uniform  array. 

Parallel  with  the  agitation  for  some  state  action  for  education 
was  an  agitation  for  social  and  pohtical  reform.  The  basis  for  the 
election  of  members  to  the  House  of  Commons  was  still  medias- 
val.     Boroughs  no  longer  inhabited  still  returned  members,  and 


Fig.  84 

Lord  Brougham 

(i 778-1868) 


346        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

sparsely  settled  regions  returned  members  out  of  all  proportion 
to  the  newly  created  city  populations.  Few,  too,  could  vol;e. 
Only  about  160,000  ^persons  in  a  population  of  10,000,000  had, 
early  in  the  century,  the  right  of  the  franchise.  The  city  popula- 
tions were  practically  disfranchised  in  favor  of  rural  landlords, 
the  nobility,  and  the  clergy.  In  1828  Protestant  Non-Conform- 
ists were  relieved  of  their  political  disability,  and  in  1829  a  similar 
enfranchisement  was  extended  to  Catholics.  In  1832  came  the 
first  real  voting  reform  in  the  passage  of  the  so-called  Third 
Reform  Bill,  after  a  most  bitter  parliamentary  struggle.  This 
reapportioned  the  membership  of  the  House  on  a  more  equitable 
basis,  and  enfranchised  those  who  owned  or  leased  lands  or 
buildings  of  a  value  of  £10  a  year.  The  result  of  this  was  to  en- 
franchise the  middle  class  of  the  population;  increase  the  number 
of  voters  (1836)  from  about  175,000  to  about  839,500  out  of 
6,023,000  adult  males;  and  effectively  break  the  power  of  the 
House  of  Lords  to  elect  the  House  of  Commons.  Progressive 
legislation  now  became  much  easier  to  secure,  and  in  1833  a  Bill 
making  a  grant  of  £20,000  a  year  to  aid  in  building  schoolhouses 
for  elementary  schools  —  the  first  government  aid  for  elementary 
education  ever  voted  in  England  —  became  a  law  (R.  299). 
*^  Progress  after  1833.  The  Law  of  1833,  though,  made  but  the 
merest  beginnings,  and  up  to  1840  the  money  granted  was  given 
to  the  two  great  national  school  societies,  and  without  regulation. 
Beginning  in  i8jp,  and  continuing  up  to  the  beginnings  of  na- 
tional education,  in  1870,  the  grants  were  state-controlled  and 
distributed  through  the  different  educational  societies.  Propo- 
sals to  add  local  taxation,  in  1853  and  1856,  were  dropped  almost 
as  soon  as  made.\  Training-schools  for  teachers  also  were  be- 
gun, and  aided  by  grants.  In  1845  the  English  ''pupil-teacher" 
system  also  was  begun  in  an  effort  to  supply  teachers  of  some 
little  training.  A  State  Department  of  Education  was  created, 
in  1856,  though  without  much  power. 

Difficulties  encountered.  In  the  meantime  liberal  leaders. 
Schools  Inquiry  Commissions,  official  reports,  and  educational 
propagandists  continued  to  pile  up  evidence  as  to  the  inade- 
quacy of  the  old  voluntary  system.  A  few  examples,  out  of 
hundreds  that  might  be  cited,  will  be  mentioned  here.  Lord 
Macaulay,  in  an  address  made  in  Parliament,  in  1847  (R.  300), 
defending  a  "Minute"  of  the  "Committee  of  Privy  Council  on 
Education"  (created  in  1839)  proposing  the  nationalization  of 


Fig.  85 

Lord  Macaulay 
(1800-59) 


NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN  ENGLAND    347 

education,  held  it  to  be  "the  right  and  duty  of  the  State  to  pro- 
vide for  the  education  of  the  common  people,"  as  an  exercise  of 
self-protection,  and  warned  the  Commons 
of  dangers  to  come  if  the  progressive  ten- 
dencies of  the  time  were  not  listened  to. 
The  Reports  of  the  school  inspectors,  too, 
revealed  conditions  in  need  of  being  rem- 
edied in  all  phases  of  educational  effort. 
The  Report  on  the  Apprenticing  of  Pauper 
ChjMren  (R.  301)  is  selected  as  typical  of 
many  similar  reports. 

So  deeply  ingrained,  though,  was  the 
English  conception  of  education  as  a  pri- 
vate and  voluntary  and  rehgious  affair  and 
no  business  of  the  State;  so  self-contained 
were  the  English  as  a  people;  and  so  little 
did  they  know  or  heed  the  progress  made 
in  other  lands,  that  the  argimients  for 
national ,  action  encountered  tremendous 
opposition  from  the  Conservative  elements,  and  often  were 
opposed  even  by  Liberals. 

The  beginnings  of  national  organization.  By  1865  it  had  be- 
come evident  to  a  majority  that  the  voluntary  system,  whatever 
its  merits,  would  never  succeed  in  educating  the  nation,  and  from 
this  time  forth  the  demand  for  some  acceptable  scheme  for  the 
organization  of  national  education  became  a  part  of  a  still  more 
general  movement  for  political  and  social  reform.  Once  more,  as 
in  1832-33,  an  education  law  was  enacted  following  the  passage 
of  a  bill  for  electoral  reform  and  the  extension  of  the  suffrage. 

Though  the  Liberal  Party  was  in  power,  it  was  well  satisfied 
with  the  Reform  Act  of  1832  because  through  it  the  middle  classes 
of  the  population,  which  the  Liberal  Party  represented,  had  gained 
control  of  the  government.  The  country,  though,  was  not  —  the 
working-classes  in  particular  demanding  a  share  in  the  govern- 
ment. Finally  the  demand  became  too  strong  to  be  resisted,  and 
the  Second  Reform  Act,  of  1867,  became  a  law.  This  abolished 
a  number  of  the  remaining  smaller  boroughs,  and  gave  the  vote 
to  a  vastly  increased  number  of  people,  particularly  city  workers. 
It  was  a  political  revolution  for  England  of  great  magnitude. 

From  the  passage  of  this  new  Reform  Act  to  1870,  the  organiza- 
tion of  national  education  only  awaited  the  formulation  of  some 


348        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

acceptable  scheme.  "We  must  educate  our  new  masters,"  now 
became  a  common  expression.  The  main  question  was  how  to 
create  schools  to  do  what  the  voluntary  schools  had  shown  them- 
selves able  to  do  for  a  part,  but  were  unable  to  do  for  all,  without 
at  the  same  time  destroying  the  vast  denominational  system 
that,  in  spite  of  its  defects,  had  "done  the  great  service  of  rearing 
a  jrace  of  teachers,  spreading  schools,  setting  up  a  standard  of 
education,  and  generally  making  the  introduction  of  a  najional 
system  possible." 

The  Elementary  Education  Bill  of  1870  (R.  304)  preserved  the 
existing  Voluntary  Schools;  divided  the  country  up  into  school 
districts;  gave  the  denominations  a  short  period  in  which  to  pro- 
vide schools,  with  aid  for  buildings;  and  thereafter,  in  any  place 
where  a  deficiency  in  school  accommodations  could  be  shown  to 
exist,  School  Boards  were  to  be  elected,  and  they  should  have 
power  to  levy  taxes  and  maintain  elementary  schools.  Existing 
Voluntary  Schools  might  be  transferred  to  the  School  Boards, 
whose  schools  were  to  be  known  as  Board  Schools.  The  schools 
were  not  ordered  made  free,  but  the  fees  of  necessitous  children 
were  to  be  provided  for  by  the  School  Boards,  and  they  might 
compel  the  attendance  of  all  children  between  the  ages  of  five  and 
twelve.  Inspection  and  grants  were  limited  to  secular  subjects, 
though  religious  teaching  was  not  forbidden.  The  central  govern- 
ment was  to  be  secular  and  neutral;  the  local  boards  might  de- 
cide as  they  saw  fit.  Such  were  the  beginnings  of  n,9JiQnal  edu- 
cation in  England. 

In  1880  elementary  education  had  been  made  fuUv  compulsory. 
and  in  1891  largely  free.  In  1893  ^^^  ^S^  ^^^  exemption  from 
attendance  was  fixed  at  eleven,  and  in  1899  this  was  raised  to 
twelve.  In  1888  county  and  borough  councils  had  been  created, 
better  to  enforce  the  Act  and  to  extend  supervision.  'In  1899  a 
Central  Board  of  Education,  under  a  President  and  a  Parlia- 
mentary Secretary,  was  created. 

In  i|902,  for  the  first  time  in  English  history,  education  of  all 
grades  —  elementary,  secondary,  and  higher;  voluntary  and 
state  —  was  brought  under  the  control  of  one  siijgle  local  authoT;^ 
ity,  and  Voluntary  Schools  were  taken  over  and  made  a  charge 
on  the  "rates"  equally  with  the  Board  Schools,  New  local  Edu- 
cational Committees  and  Councils  replaced  the  old  School  Boards, 
and  all  secular  instruction  in  state-aided  schools  of  all  types  was 
now  placed  under  their  control.     Religious  instruction  could 


NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN  ENGLAND 


349 


continue  where  desired.  In  addition,  one  third  of  the  property  of 
England,  which  had  heretofore  escaped  all  direct  taxation  for  edu- 
cation, was  now  compelled  to  pay  its  proper  share.  The  founda- 
tion principle  that  "the  wealth  of  the  State  must  educate  the 
children  of  the  State"  was  now  applied,  for  the  first  time. 

By  the  time  of  the  opening  of  the  recent  World  War  it  may  be 
said  that  English  opinion  had  about  agreed  upon  the  principle  of 
pubHcxoritrol  of  all  schools,  absolute  religious  freedom  for  teachers, 
local  option  as  to  rehgious  instruction,  large  local  Hberty  in  man- 
agement and  control,  well-trained  and  well-paid  teachers,  and  the 
fusing  of  all  types  of 
schools  into  a  democratic 
and  truly  national  school 
system,  strong  in  its  unity 
and  national  elements, 
but  free  from  centraHzed 
bureaucratic  control.  It 
was  left  for  the  World 
\\'ar  to  give  emphasis  to 
this  national  need  and  to 
permit  of  the  final  crea- 
tion of  such  an  educa- 
tional organization. 

A  national  system  at 
last  evolved.  It  is  a  little 
more  than  two  centuries 
from  the  founding  of  the 
Society  for  the  Promotion 
of  Christian  Knowledge 
(1699)  to  the  very  impor- 
tant Fisher  Education  Act 
of  August,  1 9 1 8 .  The  first 
marked  the  beginnings  of 
the  voluntary  system ;  the 
second  "the  first  real  at- 
tempt in  England  to  lay 
broad  and  deep  the  foun- 
dations of  a  scheme  oledz- 
ucation  which  would  be 
truly  national."  This  Act,  passed  by  ParUament  in  the  midst 
of  a  war  which  called  upon  the  English  people  for  heavy  sacri- 


Local  and 

Voluntary 

Schools 


Endowed 

and 
Proprietary 
Schools 


Fig.  86.  The  English  Educational 
System  as  finally  evolved 
The  years,  for  the  divisions  of  English  educa- 
tion, are  only  approximate,  as  English  educa- 
•  tion  is  more  flexible  than  that  found  in  most 
other  lands. 


350       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

fices,  completed  the  evolution  of  two  centuries  and  organized 
the  educational  resources  —  elementary,  secondary,  evening, 
adult,  technical,  and  higher  —  into  one  national  system,  ani- 
mated by  a  national  purpose,  and  aimed  at  the  accomplish- 
ment for  the  nation  of  twentieth-century  ends  on  the  most  demo- 
cratic basis  of  any  school  system  in  Europe.  In  so  doing  Hux- 
ley's educational  ladder  has  not  only  been  changed  into  a  broad 
highway,  but  the  educational  traditions  of  England  (R.  306) 
have  been  preserved  and  moulded  anew. 

The  central  national  supervisory  authority  has  been  still  further 
strengthened;  the  compulsion  to  attend  greatly  extended;  and  the 
voice  of  the  State  has  been  uttered  in  a  firmer  tone  than  ever 
before  in  EngUsh  educational  history.  Taxes  have  been  increased ; 
the  scope  of  the  school  system  extended;  all  elements  of  the  sys- 
tem better  integrated;  laggard  local  educational  authorities  sub- 
jected to  firmer  control;  the  training  of  teachers  looked  after  more 
carefully  than  ever  before;  and  the  foundations  for  unlimited  im- 
provement and  progress  in  education  laid  down.  Still,  in  doing 
all  this,  the  deep  English  deyotion  to  local  liberties  has  been 
clearly  revealed.  The  dangers  of  a  centralized  French-type  edu- 
cational bureaucracy  have  been  avoided;  necessary,  and  relatively 
high,  minimum  standards  have  been  set  up,  but  without  sacrific- 
ing that  variety  which  has  always  been  one  of  the  strong  points 
of  English  educational  effort;  and  the  legitimate  claims  of  the 
State  have  been  satisfied  without  destroying  local  initiative  and 
independence.  In  this  story  of  two  centuries  and  more  of  struggle 
to  create  a  really  national  system  of  education  for  the  people  we 
see  strongly  revealed  those  prominent  characteristics  of  English 
natipiiaTprogress  —  careful  consideration  of  new  ideas,  keen  sen- 
sitiveness to  vested  rights,  strong  sense  of  local  liberties  and 
responsibihties,  large  dependence  on  local  effort  and  good  sense, 
progress  by  compromise,  and  a  slow  grafting-on  of  the  best  ele- 
ments of  what  is  new  without  sacrificing  the  best  elements  of 
what  is  old, 

QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

1.  Show  that  the  English  method  of  slow  progress  and  after  long  discussion 
would  naturally  result  in  a  plan  bearing  evidence  of  many  compromises. 

2.  What  does  the  extensive  Charity-School  movement  in  eighteenth-century 
England  indicate  as  to  the  comparative  general  interest  in  learning  in 
England  and  the  other  lands  we  have  previously  studied? 

3.  Show  how  the  Sunday-School  instruction,  meager  as  it  was,  was  very 


NATIONAL  ORGANIZATION  IN  ENGLAND    351 

important  in  England  in  paving  the  way  for  further  educational  progress. 

4.  What  do  all  the  different  late  eighteenth-century  voluntary  educational 
movements  indicate  as  to  comparative  popular  interest  in  education  in 
England  and  Prussia?     England  and  France? 

5.  Can  you  explain  the  much  greater  percentage  of  city  poor  in  England  in 
the  late  eighteenth  and  early  nineteenth  centuries  than  in  French  or 
German  lands? 

6.  Can  you  explain  why  periods  of  prolonged  warfare  are  usually  followed 
by  periods  of  social  and  political  unrest? 

7.  Can  you  explain  why  Pestalozzian  ideas  found  such  slow  acceptance  in 
England? 

8.  Explain,  on  the  basis  of  the  English  adult  manufacturing  conception  of 
education,  why  monitorial  instruction  was  hailed  as  "a  new  expedient, 
parallel  and  rival  to  the  modern  inventions  in  the  mechanical  depart- 

\  ments." 

1     9.  To  what  extent  do  we  now  accept  Robert  Owen's  conception  of  the 
influence  of  education  on  children? 

10.  Show  how  the  many  philanthropic  societies  for  the  education  of  the 
children  of  the  poor  came  in  as  a  natural  transition  from  church  to  state 
education. 

1 1 .  Show  the  importance  of  the  School  Societies  in  accustoming  people  to 
the  idea  of  free  and  general  education. 

^^^^12.  Show  how  the  Lancastrian  system  formed  a  natural  bridge  between  pri- 

,^  vate  philanthropy  in  education  and  tax-supported  state  schools. 

I    I13.  Why  were  the  highly  mechanical  features  of  the  Lancastrian  organiza- 

\  \  tion  so  advantageous  in  its  day,  whereas  we  of  to-day  would  regard  them 

I     I  as  such  a  disadvantage? 

I     14.  Explain  how  the  Lancastrian  schools  dignified  the  work  of  the  teacher 

i  by  revealing  the  need  for  teacher-training. 

15.  Show  how  English  educational  development  during  the  nineteenth  cen- 
"^  tury  has  been  deeply  modified  by  the  progress  of  democracy. 

16.  Show  how  the  English  have  attained  to  minimum  standards  without 
imposing  uniform  requirements  that  destroy  individuality  and  initia- 
tive. 

SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  illustrative  selections 
are  reproduced: 

291.  Parhamentary  Report:  Charity-School  Education  described. 

292.  S.P.C.K.:  Cost  and  Support  of  Charity-Schools. 

293.  Raikes:  Description  of  the  Gloucester  Sunday  Schools. 

294.  Guthrie:  Organization,  Support,  and  Work  of  a  Ragged  School. 

295.  Smith,  A.:  On  the  Education  of  the  Common  People. 

296.  Malthus:  On  National  Education. 

297.  Smith,  S.:  The  School  of  Lancaster  described. 

298.  Philanthropist:  Automatic  Character  of  the  Monitorial  Schools. 

299.  Montmorency,  de:  The  First  Parliamentary  Grant  for  Education. 

300.  Macaulay:  On  the  Duty  of  the  State  to  Provide  Education. 

301.  Mosely:  Evils  of  Apprenticing  the  Children  of  Paupers. 

302.  Kay-Shuttleworth:  Typical  Reasoning  in  Opposition  to  Free  Schools. 

303.  Macnamera:  The  Duke  of  Newcastle  Commission  Report. 

304.  Statute:  Elementary  Education  Act  of  1870. 

305.  Statute:  Abolition  of  Religious  Tests  at  the  Universities. 

306.  Times:  The  Educational  Traditions  of  England. 


352       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

Adams,  Fnuads.    Histtry  of  tke  EUmentary  S€*ool  CtOtU  m  Eitftmi, 
AllcD,  W.  O.  B.  and  McOure,  E.    7W  HtmirU  F«w$;  Hisitn  •/ 

5J>.CJr.    1698-1998, 
*Binns,  H.  B.    ^  Cembury  of  EimcaHtm,  1808-1908;  Histmy^^At  Bnlisk 

amd  Fortipt  SekoU  Sockfy, 
*Bircfaenou^,  C    History  of  BIrmenltry  Edmcoiim  m  Eigftmi  mi  Wtks 
simce  1800. 
Escott,  T.  H.  S.    Social  nrttmsfonmHoms  tf  the  VictoHtm  Brm. 
Harris,  J.  H.    Robert  Raikos;  Me  ifon  «Mtf  Jku  Work. 
*Holman,  H.    EmgUsk  NcOoiial  Bdmvtiom. 

*MoDtmorency,  J.  E.  G.  de.    The  Fr^gnss  efEimcaliom  m  Em^ami, 
*Montmorenc\%  J.  E.  G.  dc    Slate  Intertentiam  m  Emelisk  BdmcaHom  to 

*Sa]moD,  David.    Joseph  Lama^er, 


CHAPTER  XXV 

AWAKENING  AN  EDUCATIONAL  CONSCIOUSNESS  IN 
THE  UNITED  STATES 

I.  EARLY  NATIONAL  ATTITUDES  AND  INTERESTS 

The  American  problem.  The  beginnings  of  state  educational 
organization  in  the  United  States  present  quite  a  different  history 
from  that  just  traced  for  Prussia,  France,  or  England.  While 
the  parochial  school  existed  in  the  Central  Colonies,  and  in  time 
had  to  be  subordinated  to  state  ends;  and  while  the  idea  of  educa- 
tion as  a  charity  had  been  introduced  into  all  the  Anglican  Colo- 
nies, and  later  had  to  be  stamped  out;  the  problem  of  educational 
organization  in  America  was  not,  as  inEurppe,  one  of  bringing 
church  schools  and  old  educational  foxmdations  into  harmonious 
working  relations  with  the  new  state  school  systems  set  up.  In- 
stead the  old  educational  foundations  were  easily  transformed  to 
adapt  them  to  the  new  conditions,  while  only  in  the  Central  Colo- 
nies did  the  religious-charity  conception  of  education  give  any 
particular  trouble.  The  American  educational  problem  was 
essentially  that  of  first  awakening,  in  a  new  land,  a  consciousness 
of  need  for  general  education;  and  second,  that  of  developing  a 
wijlingness  to  pay  for  what  it  finally  came  to  be  deemed  desirable 
to  provide. 

By  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century,  as  we  have  pointed 
out  (p.  285),  the  earlier  religious  interests  in  America  had  clearly 
begun  to  wane.  In  the  New  England  Colonies  the  school  of  the 
civil  JQwa.  had  largely  replaced  the  earlier  religious  school.  In 
the  Middle  Colonies  many  of  the  parochial  schools  had  died  out. 
In  the  Southern  Colonies,  where  the  classes  in  society  ^d  negro 
slavery  made  common  schools  impossible,  and  the  lack  of  city  life 
and  manufacturing  made  them  seem  largely  unnecessary,  the 
common  school  had  tended  to  disappear.  Even  in  New  England, 
where  the  Calvinistic  conception  of  the  importance  of  education 
had  most  firmly  established  the  idea  of  school  support,  the  eight- 
eenth century  witnessed  a  constant  struggle  to  prevent  the  dying- 
out  of  that  which  an  earlier  generation  had  deemed  it  important 
to  create. 

Effect  of  the  war  on  education.  The  effect  of  the  American 
War  for  Independence,  on  all  types  of  schools,  was  disastrous. 


354       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

The  growing  troubles  with  the  mother  country  had,  for  more 
than  a  decade  previous  to  the  opening  of  hostihties,  tended  to 
concentrate  attention  on  other  matters  than  schooling.  Political 
discussion  and  agitation  had  largely  monopolized  the  thinking  of 
the  time. 

With  the  outbreak  of  the  war  education  everywhere  suffered 
seriously.  Most  of  the  rural  and  parochial  schools  closed,  or 
continued  a  more  or  less  intermittent  existence.  In  New  York 
City,  then  the  second  largest  city  in  the  country,  practically  all 
schools  closed  with  British  occupancy  and  remained  closed  until 
after  the  end  of  the  war.  The  Latin  grammar  schools  and  acade- 
mies often  closed  from  lack  of  pupils,  while  the  colleges  were 
almost  deserted.  Harvard  and  Kings,  in  particular,  suffered 
grievously,  and  sacrificed  much  for  the  cause  of  liberty.  The 
war  engrossed  the  energies  and  the  resources  of  the  peoples  of  the 
different  Colonies,  and  schools,  never  very  securely  placed  in  the 
affections  of  the  people,  outside  of  New  England,  were  allowed  to 
fall  into  decay  or  entirely  disappear.  Meager  as  were  the  opportu- 
nities for  schoohng  before  1775,  the  opportunities  by  1790,  except 
in  a  few  cities  and  in  the  New  England  districts,  had  shrunk 
almost  to  the  vanishing  point.  For  Boston  (R.  307),  Providence 
(Rs.  309,  310),  and  a  number  of  other  places  we  have  good  pic- 
tures preserved  of  the  schools  which  actually  did  exist. 

No  real  educational  consciousness  before  about  1820.  Re- 
gardless of  the  national  land  grants  for  education  made  to  the 
new  States  (p.  371),  the  provisions  of  the  different  state  constitu- 
tions (R.  259),  the  beginnings  made  here  and  there  in  the  few 
cities  of  the  time,  and  the  early  state  laws  (R.  262),  it  can  hardly 
be  said  that  the  American  people  had  developed  an  educational 
consciousness,  outside  of  New  England  and  New  York,  before 
about  1820,  and  in  some  of  the  States,  especially  in  the  South,  a 
state  educational  consciousness  was  not  awakened  until  very 
much  later.  Even  in  New  England  there  was  a  steady  decline  in 
education  during  the  first  fifty  years  of  the  national  history. 

There  were  many  reasons  in  the  national  life  for  this  lack  of 
interest  in  education  among  the  masses  of  the  people.  The  simple 
agricultural  hfe  of  the  time,  the  homogeneity  of  the  people,  the 
absence  of  cities,  the  isolation  and  independence  of  the  villages, 
the  lack  of  full  manhood  suffrage  in  a  number  of  the  States,  the 
want  of  any  economic  demand  for  education,  and  the  fact  that  no 
important  political  question  calling  for  settlement  at  the  polls 


NEW  INFLUENCES  IN  AMERICA  355 

had  as  yet  arisen,  made  the  need  for  schools  and  learning  seem  a 
relatively  minor  one. 

When  the  people  had  finally  settled  their  political  and  com- 
mercial future  by  the  War  of  181 2-14,  and  had  built  up  a  national 
consciousness  on  a  democratic  basis  in  the  years  immediately  fol- 
lowing, and  the  Nation  at  last  possessed  the  energy,  the  money, 
and  the  interest  for  doing  so,  they  finally  turned  their  energies 
toward  the  creation  of  a  democratic  system  of  public  schools.  In 
the  meantime,  education,  outside  of  New  England,  and  in  part 
even  there,  was  left  largely  to  private  individuals,  churches,  in- 
corporated school  societies,  and  such  state  schools  for  the  children 
of  the  poor  as  might  have  been  provided  by  private  or  state 
funds,  or  the  two  combined. 

The  real  interest  in  advanced  education.  In  so  far  as  the 
American  people  may  be  said  to  have  possessed  a  real  interest  in 
education  during  the  first  half-century  of  the  national  existence, 
it  was  manifested  in  the  establishment  and  endowment  of  acade- 
mies and  collegej  rather  than  in  the  creation  of  schools  for  the 
people.  The  colonial  Latin  grammar  school  had  been  almost 
entirely  an  English  institution,  and  never  well  suited  to  American 
needs.  As  democratic  consciousness  began  to  arise,  the  demand 
came  for  a  more  practical  institution,  less  exclusive  and  less  aris- 
tocratic in  character,  and  better  adapted  in  its  instruction  to  the 
needs  of  a  frontier  society.  Arising  about  the  middle  of  the 
eighteenth  century,  a  number  of  so-called  Academies  had  been 
founded  before  the  new  National  Government  took  shape.  While 
essentially  private  institutions,  arising  from  a  church  founda- 
tion, or  more  commonly  a  local  subscription  or  endowment, 
it  became  customary  for  towns,  counties,  and  States  to  assist  in 
their  maintenance,  thus  making  them  semi^public  institutions. 
Their  management,  though,  usually  remained  in  private  hands, 
or  under  boards  or  associations. 

Beside  offering  a  fair  type  of  higher  training  before  the  days 
of  high  schools,  the  academies  also  became  training-schools  for 
teachers,  and  before  the  rise  of  the  normal  schools  were  the  chief 
source  of  supply  for  the  better  grade  of  elementary  teachers. 
These  institutions  rendered  an  important  service  during  the  first 
half  of  the  nineteenth  century,  but  were  in  time  displaced  by  the 
pubUcly  supported  and  publicly  controlled  Amejican  high  school, 
the  first  of  which  dates  from  182 1.  This  evolution  we  shall 
describe  more  in  detail  a  little  later  on. 


356       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

The  colleges  of  the  time.  Some  interest  also  was  taken  in  ca 
lege  education  during  this  early  national  period.  College  attend- 
ance, however,  was  small,  as  the  country  was  still  new  and  the 
people  were  poor.  As  late  as  1815,  Harvard  graduated  a  class  of 
but  66;  Yale  of  69;  Princeton  of  40;  Williams  of  40;  Pennsylvania 
of  15;  and  the  University  of  South  Carolina  of  37.  After  the 
organization  of  the  Union  the  nine  old  colonial  colleges  were  re- 
organized, and  an  attempt  was  made  to  bring  them  into  closer 
harmony  with  the  ideas  and  needs  of  the  people  and  the  govern- 
ments of  the  States.  Dartmouth,  Kings  (now  rechristened 
Columbia),  and  Pennsylvania  were  for  a  time  changed  into  state 
institutions,  and  an  unsuccessful  attempt  was  made  to  make  a 
state  university  for  Virginia  out  of  William  and  Mary.  Fifteen 
additional  colleges  were  organized  by  1800,  and  fourteen  more  by 
1820.  Between  1790  and  1825  there  was  much  discussion  as  to 
the  desirability  of  founding  a  national  university  at  the  seat  of 
government,  and  Washington  in  his  will  (1799)  left,  for  that  time, 
a  considerable  sum  to  the  Nation  to  inaugurate  the  new  under- 
taking. Nothing  ever  came  of  it,  however.  Before  1825  six 
States  —  Georgia,  Virginia,  North  Carolina,  South  CaroHna, 
Indiana,  and  Michigan  —  had  laid  the  foundations  of  future 
state  universities.  The  National  Government  had  also  granted 
to  each  new  Western  State  two  entire  townships  of  land  to  help 
endow  a  university  in  each  —  a  stimulus  which  eventually  led  to 
the  establishment  of  a  state  university  in  every  Western  State. 

A  half-century  of  transition.  The  first  half-century  of  the 
national  life  may  be  regarded  as  a  period  of  transition  from  the 
church-control  idea  of  education  over  to  the  idea  of  education 
under  the  control  of  and  supported  by  the  State.  Though  many 
of  the  early  States  had  provided  for  state  school  systems  in  their 
constitutions  (R.  259),  the  schools  had  not  been  set  up,  or  set  up 
only  here  and  there.  It  required  time  to  make  this  change  in 
thinking.  Up  to  the  period  of  the  beginnings  of  our  national 
development  education  had  almost  everywhere  been  regarded  as 
an  affair  of  the  Church,  somewhat  akin  to  baptism,  marriage,  the 
administration  of  the  sacraments,  and  the  burial  of  the  dead. 
Even  in  New  England,  which  formed  an  exception,  the  evolution 
of  the  civic  school  from  the  church  school  was  not  yet  complete. 

The  church  charity-school  had  become,  as  we  have  seen  (p.  240), 
a  familiar  institution  before  the  Revolution.  The  different  churches 
after  the  war  continued  their  efforts  to  maintain  their  church 


NEW  INFLUENCES  IN  AMERICA  357 

charity-schools,  though  there  was  for  a  time  a  decrease  in  both 
their  numbers  and  their  effectiveness. 

In  the  meantime  the  demand  for  education  grew  rather  rapidly, 
and  the  task  soon  became  too  big  for  the  churches  to  handle. 
For  long  the  churches  made  an  effort  to  keep  up,  as  they  were 
loath  to  relinquish  in  any  way  their  former  hold  on  the  training 
of  the  young.  The  churches,  however,  were  not  interested  in  the 
problem  except  in  the  old  way,  and  this  was  not  what  the  new 
democracy  wanted.  The  result  was  that,  with  the  coming  of 
nationality  and  the  slow  but  gradual  growth  of  a  national  con- 
sciousness, national  pride,  national  needs,  and  the  gradual  devel- 
opment of  national  resources  in  the  shape  of  taxable  property  — 
all  alike  combined  to  make  secular  instead  of  religious  schools 
seem  both  desirable  and  possible  to  a  constantly  increasing  num- 
ber of  citizens. 

<^        II.  AWAKENING  AN  EDUCATIONAL  CONSCIOUSNESS 

Between  about  1810  and  1830  a  number  of  new  forces  —  phil- 
anthropic, political,  social,  economic  —  combined  to  change  the 
earlier  attitude  by  producing  conditions  which  made  state  rather 
than  church  control  and  support  of  education  seem  both  desirable 
and  feasible.  The  change,  too,  was  markedly  facilitated  by  the 
work  of  a  number  of  semi-private  philanthropic  agencies  which 
now  began  the  work  of  founding  schools  and  building  up  an  inter- 
est in  education,  the  most  important  of  which  were:  (i)  the  Sun- 
day-School movement;  (2)  the  City  School  Societies;  (3)  the 
Lancastrian  movement;  and  (4)  the  Inf ant-School  Societies. 
These  will  be  described  briefly,  and  their  influence  in  awakening 
an  educational  consciousness  pointed  out. 

The  Sunday-School  movement.  The  Sunday  School,  as  a 
means  of  providing  the  merest  rudiments  of  secular  and  religious 
learning,  had  been  made,  through  the  initiative  of  Raikes  of 
Gloucester  (p.  337),  a  very  important  English  institution  for 
providing  the  beginnings  of  instruction  for  the  children  of  the  city 
poor.  Raikes's  idea  was  soon  carried  to  the  United  States.  In 
1791  "The  First  Day,  or  Sunday  School  Society,"  was  organized 
at  Philadelphia,  for  the  establishment  of  Sunday  Schools  in  that 
city.  In  1 793  Katy  Ferguson's  "  School  for  the  Poor  "  was  opened 
in  New  York,  and  this  was  followed  by  an  organization  of  New 
York  women  for  the  extension  of  secular  instruction  among  the 
poor.     In  1797  Samuel  Slater's  Factory  School  was  opened  at 


358       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

Pawtucket,  Rhode  Island.  These  American  Sunday  Schools, 
being  open  to  all  instead  of  only  to  the  poor  and  lowly,  had  a 
small  but  an  increasing  influence  in  leveling  classdistinctions  and 
in  making  a  common  day-school  seem  possible.  The  movement 
for  secular  instruction  on  Sundays,  though,  soon  met  in  America 
with  the  opposition  of  the  churches,  and  before  long  they  took 
over  the  idea,  superseded  private  initiative  and  control,  and 
changed  the  character  of  the  instruction  from  a  day  of  secular 
work  to  an  hour  or  so  of  religious  teaching.  The  Sunday  School, 
in  consequence,  never  exercised  the  influence  in  educational  deyel- 
opment  in  America  that  it  did  in  England. 

The  City  School  Societies.  These  were  patterned  after  the 
English  charity-school  subscription  societies,  and  were  formed  in 
a  number  of  American  cities  during  the  first  quarter  of  the  nine- 
teenth century  for  the  purpose  of  providing  the  rudiments  of  an 
education  to  those  too  poor  to  pay  for  schooling.  These  Societies 
were  usually  organized  by  philanthropic  ^citizens,  willing  to  con- 
tribute something  yearly  to  provide  some  little  education  for  a 
few  of  the  many  children  in  the  city  having  no  opportunities  for 
any  instruction.  A  number  of  these  Societies  were  able  to  effect 
some  financial  connection  with  the  city  or  the  State. 

"  The  Public  School  Society."  Perhaps  the  most  famous  of  all 
the  early  subscription  societies  for  the  maintenance  of  schools  for 
the  poor  was  the  ''New  York  Free  School  Society,"  which  later 
changed  its  name  to  that  of  "The  Public  School  Society  of  New 
York."  This  was  organized,  in  1805,  under  the  leadership  of 
De  Witt  Clinton,  then  mayor  of  the  city,  he  heading  the  subscrip- 
tion Ust  with  a  promise  of  $200  a  year  for  support.  On  May  14, 
1806,  the  following  advertisement  appeared  in  the  daily  papers: 

FREE  SCHOOL 

The  Trustees  of  the  Society  for  establishing  a  Free  School  in  the 
city  of  New  York,  for  the  education  of  such  poor  children  as  do  not 
belong  to,  or  are  not  provided  for  by  any  religious  Society,  having 
engaged  a  Teacher,  and  procured  a  School  House  for  the  accommo- 
dation of  a  School,  have  now  the  pleasure  of  announcing  that  it  is 
proposed  to  receive  scholars  of  the  descriptions  alluded  to  without 
delay ;  applications  may  be  made  to,  &c. 

Four  days  later  the  officers  of  the  Society  issued  a  general 
appeal  to  the  public  (R.  311),  settmg  forth  the  purposes  of  the 
Society  and  soliciting  funds. 

This  Society  was  chartered  by  the  legislature  "to  provide 


NEW  INFLUENCES  IN  AMERICA  359 

schooling  for  all  children  who  are  the  proper  objects  of  a  gratui- 
tousjediication."  It  organized  free  pubUc  education  in  the  city, 
secured-Xunds,  built  schoolhouses,  provided  and  trained  teachers, 
and  ably  supplemented  the  work  of  the  private  and  church  schools. 
By  its  energy  and  its  persistence  it  secured  for  itself  a  large  share 
of  public  confidence,  and  aroused  a  constantly  increasing  interest 
in  the  cause  of  popular  education.  In  1853,  after  it  had  educated 
over  600,000  children  and  trained  over  1 200  teachers,  this  Society, 
its  work  done,  surrendered  its  charter  and  turned  over  its  buildings 
and  equipment  to  the  public-school  department  of  the  city,  which 
had  been  created  by  the  legislature  in  1842. 

School  Societies  elsewhere.  The  "  Benevolent  Society  of  the 
City  of  Baltimore  for  the  Education  of  the  Female  Poor,"  founded 
in  1799,  and  the  "Male  Free  Society  of  Baltimore,"  organized  a 
little  later,  were  other  of  these  early  school  societies,  though 
neither  became  so  famous  as  the  Public  School  Society  of  New 
York.  The  schools  of  the  city  of  Washington  were  started  by  sub- 
scription, in  ^804,  and  for  some  time  were  in  part  supported  by 
subscriptions  from  public-spirited  citizens.  This  society  did  an 
important  work  in  accustoming  the  people  of  the  capital  city  to 
the  provision  of  some  form  of  free  education. 

In  1800  "The  Philadelphia  Society  for  the  Free  Instruction 
of  Indigent  Boys"  was  formed,  which  a  little  later  changed  to 
"The  Philadelphia  Society  for  the  Establishment  and  Support  of 
Charity  Schools."  In  1814  "The  Society  for  the  Promotion  of  a 
Rational  System  of  Education"  was  organized  in  Philadelphia, 
and  four  years  later  the  public  sentiment  awakened  by  a  combina- 
tion of  the  work  of  this  Society  and  the  coming  of  the  Lancastrian 
system  of  instruction  enabled  the  city  to  secure  a  special  law  per- 
mitting Philadelphia  to  organize  a  system  of  city  schools  for  the 
education  of  the  children  of  its  poor.  Other  societies  which  ren- 
dered useful  educational  service  include  the  "Mechanics  and 
Manufacturers  Association,"  of  Providence,  Rhode  Island,  organ- 
ized in  1789  (Rs.  308,  310);  "The  Albany  Lancastrian  School 
Society,"  organized  in  1826,  for  the  education  of  the  poor  of  the 
city  in  monitorial  schools;  and  the  school  societies  organized  in 
Savannah  in  1818,  and  Augusta,  in  182 1 , "  to  afford  education  to  the 
children  of  indigent  parents."  Both  these  Georgia  societies  re- 
ceived some  support  from  state  funds. 

The  formation  of  these  school  societies,  the  subscriptions  made 
by  the  leading  men  of  the  cities,  the  bequests  for  education,  and 


36o        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

the  grants  of  some  city  and  state  aid  to  these  societies,  all  of  which 
in  time  became  somewhat  common,  indicate  a  slowly  rising  inter- 
est in  providing  schools  for  the  education  of  all.  This  rising 
interest  in  education  was  greatly  stimulated  by  the  introduction 
from  England,  about  this  time,  of  a  new  and  what  for  the  time 
seemed  a  wonderful  system  for  the  organization  of  education,  the 
Lancastrian  monitorial  plan, 
^  The  Lancastrian  monitorial  schools.  Church-of -England  ideas 
were  not  in  much  favor  in  the  United  States  for  some  time  after 
the  close  of  the  Revolutionary  War,  and  in  consequence  it  was  the 
Lancastrian  plan  which  was  brought  over  and  popularized.  In 
1806  the  first  monitorial  school  was  opened  in  New  York  City, 
and,  once  introduced,  the  system  quickly  spread  from  Massachu- 
setts to  Georgia,  and  as  far  west  as  Louisville  and  Detroit.  In 
1 8 18  Lancaster  himself  went  to  America,  and  was  received 
with  much  distinction.  Most  of  the  remaining  twenty  years  of 
his  Ufe  were  spent  in  organizing  and  directing  schools  in  various 
parts  of  the  United  States. 

In  many  of  the  rising  cities  of  the  eastern  part  of  the  country 
the  first  free  schools  established  were  Lancastrian  schools.  The 
system  provided  education  at  so  low  a  cost  (p.  360)  that  it  made 
the  education  of  all  for  the  first  time  seem  possible.  The  first 
free  schools  in  Philadelphia  (18 18)  were  an  outgrowth  of  Lancas- 
trian influence,  as  was  also  the  case  in  many  other  Pennsylvania 
cities.  Baltimore  began  a  Lancastrian  school  six  years  before  the 
organization  of  public  schools  was  permitted  by  law.  A  number 
of  monitorial  high  schools  were  organized  in  different  parts  of  the 
United  States,  and  it  was  even  proposed  that  the  plan  should  be 
adopted  in  the  colleges.  A  number  of  New  England  cities,  that 
already  had  other  type  schools,  investigated  the  new  moni2_ 
tonal  plan  and  were  impressed  with  its  many  important  points 
of  superiority  over  methods  then  in  use.  The  Report  of  the 
Investigating  Committee  (1828)  for  Boston  (R.  312),  forms  a 
good  example  of  such.  It  is  not  strange  that  the  new  plan 
aroused  widespread  enthusiasm  in  many  discerning  men,  and  for 
almost  a  quarter  of  a  century  was  advocated  as  the  best  system 
of  education  then  known.  As  in  England,  though,  the  system 
was  very  popular  from  about  1810  to  1830,  but  by  1840  its 
popularity  was  over. 

The  Lancastrian  schools  materially  hastened  the  adoption  of 
the  free  school  system  in  all  the  Northern  States  by  gradually  ac- 


NEW  INFLUENCES  IN  AMERICA 


361 


customing  people  to  bearing  the  necessary  taxation  which  free 
schools  entail.  They  also  made  the  common  school  common  and 
much  talked  of,  and  awakened  thought  and  provoked  discussion 
on  the  question  of  pubHc  edu- 
cation. They  likewise  digni- 
fied the  work  of  the  teacher 
by  showing  the  necessity  for 
teacher-training.  The  Lan- 
castrian Mo.del  Schools,  first 
established  in  the  United 
States  in  1818,  were  the  pre- 
cursors of  the  American  nor- 
mal schools. 

Coming  of  the  Infant  School. 
A  curious  early  condition  in 
America  was  that,  in  some  of 
the  cities  where  pubHc  schools 
had  been  estabhshed,  by  one 
agency  or  another,  no  pro- 
vision had  been  made  for  be- 
giruifirs.  These  were  supposed 
to  obtain  the  elements  of  read- 
ing at  home,  or  in  the  Dame 
Schools.  In  Boston,  for  exam- 
ple, where  public  schools  were 
maintained  by  the  city,  no 
children  could  be  received 
into  the  schools  who  had  not 
learned  to  read  and  write  (R.  314  a).  This  made  the  common 
age  of  admission  somewhere  near  eight  years.  The  same  was  in 
part  true  of  Hartford,  New  York,  Philadelphia,  Baltimore,  and 
other  cities.  WTien  the  monitorial  schools  were  estabhshed  they 
tended  to  restrict  their  membership  in  a  similar  manner,  though 
not  always  able  to  do  so. 

Li  1816  there  came  to  America,  also  from  England,  a  valuable 
supplement  to  education  as  then  known  in  the  form  of  the  so- 
called  Infant  Schools  (p.  361).  First  introduced  at  Boston  (R. 
313),  the  Lifant  Schools  proved  popular,  and  in  1818  the  city  ap- 
propriated $5000  for  the  purpose  of  organizing  such  schools  to 
supplement  the  public-school  system.  These  were  to  admit 
children  at  four  years  of  age,  were  to  be  known  as  primary  schools, 


Fig.  87 

"Model"  School  Building  of  the 

Public  School  Society 

Erected  in  1 843 .  Cost  (with  site) ,  $  1 7  ,cxx5. 
A  typical  New  York  school  building,  after 
1830.  The  infant  or  primary  school  was  on 
the  first  floor,  the  second  floor  contained  the 
girls'  school,  and  the  third  floor  the  boys' 
school.  Each  floor  had  one  large  room 
seating  252  children;  the  primary  school- 
room could  be  divided  into  two  rooms  by 
folding  doors,  so  as  to  segregate  the  infant 
class.  This  building  was  for  long  regarded 
as  the  perfection  of  the  builder's  art,  and 
its  picture  was  printed  for  years  on  the 
cover  of  the  Society's  Annual  Reports. 


362        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

were  to  be  taught  by  women,  were  to  be  open  all  the  year  round, 
and  were  to  prepare  the  children  for  admission  to  the  city  schools, 
which  by  that  time  had  come  to  be  known  as  English  grammar 
schools.  Providence,  similarly,  established  primary  (Infant) 
schools  in  1828  for  children  between  the  ages  of  four  and  eight, 
to  supplement  the  work  of  the  public  schools,  there  called  wjit- 
ing  schools. 

For  New  England  the  estabUshment  of  primary  schools  virtu- 
ally took  over  the  Dame^SchpoHnstruction  as  a  public  function, 
and  added  the  primary  grades  to  the  previously  existing  school. 
We  have  here  the  origin  of  the  division,  often  still  retained  at  least 
in  name  in  the  Eastern  States,  of  the  "primary  grades"  and  the 
"grammar  grades"  of  the  elementary  school. 

Primary  education  organized.  The  Infant-School  idea  was 
soon  somewhat  generally  adopted  by  the  Eastern  cities,  and 


1700 


1800 


1830 


1860 


1890 


Fig.  88.  Evolution  of  the  Essential  Features  of  the 
American  Public  School  System 


changed  somewhat  to  make  of  it  an  American  primary  school. 
Where  children  had  not  been  previously  admitted  to  the  schools 
without  knowing  how  to  read,  as  in  Boston,  they  supplemented 
the  work  of  the  public  schools  by  adding  a  new  school  beneath. 
Where  the  reverse  had  been  the  case,  as  in  New  York  City,  the 
organization  of  Infant  Schools  as  Junior  Departments  enabled  the 
existing  schools  to  advance  their  work.  Everywhere  it  resulted, 
eventually,  in  the  organization  of  primary  and  grammar  school 
departments,  often  with  intermediate  departments  in  between, 
and,  with  the  somewhat  contemporaneous  evolution  of  the  first 
high  schools,  the  main  outlines  of  the  American  free  public-school 
system  were  now  complete. 


NEW  INFLUENCES  IN  AMERICA  363 

These  four  important  educational  movements  —  the  secular 
Sunday  School,  the  semi-public  city  School  Societies,  the  Lan- 
cas]&ian  plan  for  instruction,  and  the  Infant-School  idea  —  all 
arising  in  philanthropy,  came  as  successive  educational  ideas  to 
America  during  the  first  half  of  the  nineteenth  century,  supple- 
mented one  another,  and  together  accustomed  a  new  generation 
to  the  idea  of  a  common  school  for  all. 


'^ 


III.    SOCIAL,  POLITICAL,  AND  ECONOMIC  INFLUENCES 

It  is  hardly  probable,  however,  that  these  philanthropic  efforts 
alone,  valuable  as  they  were,  could  have  resulted  in  the  great 
American  battle  for  tax-supported  schools,  at  as  early  a  date  as 
this  took  place,  had  they  not  been  supplemented  by  a  number  of 
other  movements  of  a  social,  political,  and  economic  character 
which  in  themselves  materially  changed  the  nature  and  direction 
of  our  national  life.  The  more  important  of  these  were:  (i)  The 
rise  of  cities  and  of  manufacturing,  (2)  the  extension  of  the  suf- 
frage, and  (3)  the  rise  of  new  class-demands  for  schools. 

Growth  of  city  population  and  manufacturing.  At  the  time  of 
the  inauguration  of  the  National  Government  nearly  every  one  in 
America  lived  on  the  farm  or  in  some  little  village.  The  first 
forty  years  of  the  national  life  were  essentially  an  agricultural  and 
a  pioneer  period.  Even  as  late  as  1820  there  were  but  thirteen 
cities  of  8000  inhabitants  or  over  in  the  whole  of  the  twenty-three 
States  at  that  time  comprising  the  Union,  and  these  thirteen  cities 
contained  but  4.9  per  cent  of  the  total  population  of  the  Nation. 

After  about  1825  these  conditions  began  to  change.  By  1320 
many  little  villages  were  springing  up,  and  these  frequently 
proved  the  nuclei  for  future  cities.  In  Nev;-  England  many  of 
these  places  were  in  the  vicinity  of  some  waxrfall,  where  cheap 
power  made  manufacturing  on  a  large  scale  possible.  Lowell, 
Massachusetts,  which  in  1820  did  not  exist  and  in  1840  had  a 
population  of  over  twenty  thousand  people,  collected  there 
largely  to  work  in  the  mills,  is  a  good  illustration.  Other  cities, 
such  as  Cincinnati  and  Detroit,  grew  because  of  their  advanta- 
geous situation  as  exchange  and  wholesale  centers.  With  the 
revival  of  trade  and  commerce  after  the  second  war  with  Great 
Britain  the  cities  grew  rapidly  both  in  number  and  size. 

The  rise  of  the  new  cities  and  the  rapid  growth  of  the  older  ones 
materially  changed  the  nature  of  the  educatioial  problem,  by  pro- 
ducing an  entirely  new  set  of  social  and  educational  conditions  for 


364       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

the  people  of  the  Central  and  Northern  States  to  solve.  The 
South,  with  its  plantation  life,  negro  slavery,  and  absence  of 
manufacturing  was  largely  unaffected  by  these  changed  condi- 
tions until  well  after  the  close  of  the  Civil  War.  In  consequence 
the  educational  awakening  there  did  not  come  for  nearly  half  a 
century  after  it  came  in  the  North.  In  the  cities  in  the  coasF 
States  north  of  Maryland,  but  particularly  in  those  of  New  York 
and  New  England,  manufacturing  developed  very  rapidly.  Cot- 
ton-spinning in  particular  became  a  New  England  industry,  as  did 
also  the  weaving  of  wool,  while  Pennsylvania  became  the  center 
of  the  iron  manufacturing  industries. 

The  development  of  this  new  type  of  factory  work  meant  the 
beginnings  of  the  breakdown  of  the  old  home  and  village  indus- 
tries, the  eventual  abandonment  of  the  age-old  apprenticeship 
system  (Rs.  200,  201),  the  start  of  the  cityward  movement  of  the 
rural  population,  and  the  concentration  of  manufacturing  in  large 
establishments,  employing  many  hands  to  perform  continuously 
certain  limited  phases  of  the  manufacturing  process.  This  ui 
time  was  certain  to  mean  a  change  in  educational  methods.  It 
also  called  for  the  concentration  of  both  capital  and  labor.  ^^The 
rise  of  the  factory  system,  business  on  a  large  scale,  and  clreup*" 
and  rapid  transportation,  all  combined  to  diminish  the  impor- 
tance of  agriculture  and  to  change  the  city  from  an  unimportant  to 
a  very  important  position  in  our  national  life.  The  13  cities  of 
1820  increased  to  44.  by  1840,  and  to  141  by  i860.  There  were 
four  times  as  many  cities  in  the  North,  too,  where  manufacturing 
had  found  a  home,  as  in  the  South,  which  remained  essentially 
agricultural. 

New  social  problems  in  the  cities.  The  many  changes  in  the 
nature  of  industry  and  of  village  and  home  life,  effected  by  the 
development  of  the  factory  system  and  the  concentration  of  man- 
ufacturing and  population  in  the  cities,  also  contributed  materi- 
ally in  changing  tile  character  of  the  old  educational  problem. 
When  the  cities  wele  as  yet  but  little  villages  in  size  and  charac- 
ter, homogeneous  in  their  populations,  and  the  many  social  and 
moral  problems  incident  to  the  congestion  of  peoples  of  mixed 
character  had  not  is  yet  arisen,  the  church  and  charity  and  pri- 
vate school  solution  of  the  educational  problem  was  reasonably 
satisfactory.  As  the  cities  now  increased  rapidly  in  size,  became 
more  city-hke  in  (^aracter,  drew  to  them  diverse  elements  pre- 
viously largely  unlnown,  and  were  required  by  state  laws  to  ex- 


NEW  INFLUENCES  IN  AMERICA 


365 


tend  the  right  of  suffrage  to  all  their  citizens,  the  need  for  a  new 
type  of  educational  organization  began  slowly  but  clearly  to  mani- 
fest itself  to  an  increasing  number  of  citizens.  The  church,  char- 
ity, and  private  school  system  completely  broke  down  under  the 
new  strain.  School  Societies  and  Educational  Associations,  or- 
ganized for  propaganda,  now  arose  in  the  cities;  grants  of  city  or 
state  funds  for  the  partial  support  of  both  church  and  society 
schools  were  demanded  and  obtained;  and  numbers  of  charity 
organizations  began  to  be  estabUshed  in  the  different  cities  to  en- 
able them  to  handle  better  the  new  problems  of  pauperism,  in- 
temperance, and  Juvenile  dehnquency  which  arose. 

The  extension  of  the  suffrage.  The  Constitution  of  the 
United  States,  though 
framed  by  the  ablest 
men  of  the  time,  was 
framed  by  men  who 
represented  the  old 
aristocratic  concep- 
tion of  education  and 
government.  The 
same  was  true  of  the 
conventions  which 
framed  practically  all 
the  early  state  con- 
stitutions. The  early 
period  of  the  national 
life  was  thus  charac- 
terized by  the  rule  of 
a  class  —  a  very  well- 
educated  and  a  very 
capable  class,  to  be 
sure  —  but  a  class 
elected  by  a  ballot 
based  on  property 
qualifications  and  be- 


States  shaded  granted  full  suffrage 
at  the  time  of  admission  to  the  Union  • 


Fig.  89.  Dates  of  the  granting  of 
Full  Manhood  Suffrage 
Some  of  the  older  States  granted  almost  full  man- 
hood suffrage  at  an  earlier  date,  retaining  a  few  minor 
restrictions  until  the  date  given  on  the  map.  States 
shaded  granted  full  suffrage  at  the  time  of  admission 
to  the  Union. 


longing  to  the  older  type  of  political  and  social  thinking. 

Notwithstanding  the  statements  of  the  Declaration  of  Inde- 
pendence, the  change  came  but  slowly.  Up  to  181 5  but  four 
States  had  granted  the  right  to  vote  to  all  male  citizens,  regard- 
less of  property  holdings  or  other  somewhat  similar  restrictions. 
After  181 5  a  democratic  movement,  which  sought  to  abolish  all 


366        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

class  rule  and  all  political  inequalities,  arose  and  rapidly  gained 
strength.  In  this  the  new  States  to  the  westward,  with  their  ab- 
sence of  old  estates  or  large  fortunes,  and  where  men  were  judged 
more  on  their  merits  than  in  an  older  society,  were  the  leaders. 
As  will  be  seen  from  the  map,  every  new  State  admitted  east  of 
the  Mississippi  River,  except  Ohio  (admitted  in  1802),  where  the 
New  England  element  predominated,  and  Louisiana  (181 2),  pro- 
vided for  full  manhood  suffrage  at  the  time  of  its  admission  to 
statehood.  Five  additional  Eastern  States  had  extended  the 
same  full  voting  privileges  to  their  citizens  by  1845,  while  the  old 
requirements  had  been  materially  modified  in  most  of  the  other 
Northern  States.  This  democratic  movement  for  the  leveling  of 
all  class  distinctions  between  white  men  became  very  marked, 
after  1820;  came  to  a  head  in.  the  election  of  Andrew  Jackson  as 
President,  in  1828;  and  the  final  result  was  full  manhood  suffrage 
in  all  the  States.  This  gave  the  farmer  in  the  West  and  the  new 
manufacturing  classes  in  the  cities  a  preponderating  influence  in 
the  affairs  of  government. 

Educational  significance  of  the  extension  of  suffrage.  The 
educational  significance  of  the  extension  of  full  manhood  suffrage 
to  all  was  enormous  and  far-reaching. 

There  now  took  place  in  the  United  States,  after  about  1825, 
what  took  place  in  England  after  the  passage  of  the  Second  Re^ 
form  Act  (p.  347)  of  1867.  With  the  extension  of  the  suffrage  to 
all  classes  of  the  population,  poor  as  well  as  rich,  laborer,  as  well 
as  employer,  there  came  to  thinking  men,  often  for  the  first  time, 
a  realization  that  general  education  had  become  a  fundamental^ 
necessity  for  the  State,  and  that  the  general  education  of  all  in  the 
elements  of  knowledge  and  civic  virtue  must  now  assume  that 
importance  in  the  minds  of  the  leaders  of  the  State  that  the  edu- 
cation of  a  few  for  the  service  of  the  Church  and  of  the  many  for 
simple  church  membership  had  once  held  in  the  minds  of  ecclesi- 
astics. 
e>^  /-  Governors  now  began  to  recommend  to  their  legislatures  the 
-rr~  establishment  of  tax-supported  schools,  and  public  men  began 
to  urge  state  action  and  state  control.  After  about  1825  many 
labor  unions  were  formed,  and  the  representatives  of  these  new 
organizations  joined  in  the  demands  for  schools  and  education, 
urging  the  free  education  of  their  children  as  a  natural  right 
Many  resolutions  were  adopted  by  these  organizations  demanding 
free  state-supported  schools. 


NEW  INFLUENCES  IN  AMERICA  367 

IV.  ALIGNMENT  OF  INTERESTS,  AND  PROPAGANDA 

The  alignment  of  interests.  The  second  quarter  of  the  nine- 
teenth century  may  be  said  to  have  witnessed  the  battle  for  tax- 
supported,  pubUcly  controlled  and  directed,  and  non-sectarian 
common  schools.  In  1825  such  schools  were  still  the  distant  hope 
of  statesmen  and  reformers;  in  1850  they  had  become  an  actuality 
in  almost  every  Northern  State.  The  twenty-five  years  interven- 
ing marked  a  period  of  pubHc  agitation  and  educational  propa- 
ganda; of  many  hard  legislative  fights;  of  a  struggle  to  secure  de- 
sired legislation,  and  then  to  hold  what  had  been  secured;  of  many 
bitter  contests  with  church  and  private-school  interests,  which 
felt  that  their  ''vested  rights"  were  being  taken  from  them;  and 
of  occasional  referenda  in  which  the  people  were  asked,  at  the 
next  election,  to  advise  the  legislature  as  to  what  to  do.  Except- 
ing the  battle  for  the  abolition  of  slavery,  perhaps  no  question  has 
ever  been  before  the  American  people  for  settlement  which  caused 
so  much  feeling  or  aroused  such  bitter  antagonisms.  The  friends 
of  free  schools  were  at  first  commonly  regarded  as  fanatics,  dan- 
gerous to  the  State,  and  the  opponents  of  free  schools  were  con- 
sidered by  them  as  old-time  conservatives  or  as  selfish  members 
of  society. 

Naturally  such  a  bitter  discussion  of  a  public  question  forced  an 
alignment  of  the  people  for  or  against  publicly  supported  and 
controlled  schools. 

The  work  of  propaganda.  To  meet  the  arguments  of  the  ob- 
jectors, to  change  the  opinions  of  a  thinking  few  into  the  common 
opinion  of  the  many,  to  overcome  prejudice,  and  to  awaken  the 
pubUc  conscience  to  the  public  need  for  free  and  common  schools 
in  such  a  democratic  society,  was  the  work  of  a  generation.  To 
convince  the  masses  of  the  people  that  the  scheme  of  state  schools 
was  not  only  practicable,  but  also  the  best  and  most  economical 
means  for  giving  their  children  the  benefits  of  an  education;  to 
convince  propertied  citizens  that  taxation  for  education  was  in  the 
interests  of  both  pubhc  and  private  welfare;  to  convince  legisla- 
tors that  it  was  safe  to  vote  for  free-school  bills;  and  to  overcome 
the  opposition  due  to  apathy,  religious  jealousies,  and  private  in- 
terests, was  the  work  of  years.  In  time,  though,  the  desirability 
of  common,  free,  tax-supported,  non-sectarian,  state-controlled 
schools  became  evident  to  a  majority  of  the  citizens  in  the  differ- 
ent American  States,  and  as  it  did  the  American  State  School, 


368        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

free  and  equally  open  to  all,  was  finally  evolved  and  took  its  place 
as  the  most  important  institution  in  the  national  life  working  for 
the  perpetuation  of  a  free  democracy  and  the  advancement  of  the 
public  weKare. 

For  this  work  of  propaganda  hundreds  of  School  Societies  and 
Educational  Associations  were  organized;  many  conventions 
were  Tield,  and  many  resolutions  favoring  state  schools  were 
adopted;  many  "Letters"  and  "Addresses  to  the  Public"  were 
written  and  published;  public-spirited  citizens  traveled  over  the 
country,  making  addresses  to  the  people  explaining  the  advan- 
tages of  free  state  schools;  many  public-spirited  men  gave  the  best 
years  of  their  lives  to  the  state-school  propaganda;  and  many  gov- 
ernors sent  communications  on  the  subject  to  legislatures  not  yet 
convinced  as  to  the  desirability  of  state  action.  At  each  meeting 
of  the  legislatures  for  years  a  deluge  of  resolutions,  memorials, 
and  petitions  for  and  against  free  schools  met  the  members. 

The  invention  of  the  steam  printing  press  came  at  about  this 
time,  and  the  first  modern  newspapers  at  a  cheap  price  now  ap- 
peared. These  usually  espoused  progressive  measures,  and  tre- 
mendously influenced  public  sentiment.  Those  not  closely  con- 
nected with  church  or  private-school  interests  usually  favored 
public  tax-supported  schools. 

QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

1 .  Explain  why  the  development  of  a  national  consciousness  was  practically 
necessary  before  an  educational  consciousness  could  be  awakened. 

2.  Show  why  it  was  natural,  suffrage  conditions  considered,  that  the  early 
interest  should  have  been  in  advanced  education. 

3.  Why  did  the  Sunday-School  movement  prove  of  so  much  less  usefulness 
in  America  than  in  England? 

4.  Show  the  analogy  between  the  earlier  school  societies  for  educational 
work  and  other  forms  of  modern  associative  effort. 
Explain  the  great  popularity  of  the  Lancastrian  schools  over  those  previ- 
ously common  in  America. 

What  were  two  of  the  important  contributions  of  the  Infant-School  idea 
to  American  education? 

Why  are  schools  and  education  much  more  needed  in  a  country  experi- 
encing a  city  and  manufacturing  development  than  in  a  country  experi- 
encing an  agricultural  development? 

8.  Show  how  the  development  of  cities  caused  the  old  forms  of  education  to 
break  down,  and  made  evident  the  need  for  a  new  type  of  education. 

9.  Show  how  each  extension  of  the  suffrage  necessitates  an  extension  of 
educational  opportunities  and  advantages. 


NEW  INFLUENCES  IN  AMERICA  369 


SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  illustrative  selec- 
tions are  reproduced: 

307.  Fowle:  The  Schools  of  Boston  about  1790-1815. 

308.  Rhode  Island:  Petition  for  Free  Schools,  1799. 

309.  Providence:  Rules  and  Regulations  for  the  Schools  in  1820. 

310.  Providence:  A  Memorial  for  Better  Schools,  1837. 

311.  Bourne:  Beginnings  of  Public  Education  in  New  York  City. 

312.  Boston  Report:  Advantages  of  the  Monitorial  System. 

313.  Wightman:  Establishment  of  Primary  Schools  in  Boston. 

314.  Boston:  The  Elementary-School  System  in  1823. 

315.  Philadelphia:  Report  of  Workingmen's  Committee  on  Schools, 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

Binns,  H.  B.     A  Century  of  Education,  1808-1908. 
Boese,  Thos.     Public  Education  in  the  City  of  New  York. 
Cubberley,  E.  P.     Public  Education  in  the  United  States. 
*Fitzpatrick,.  E.  A.    The  Educational  Views  and  Influences  of  De  Witt 
Clinton. 
McManis,  J.  T.     "The  Public  School  Society  of  New  York  City";  in 
Educational  Review,  vol.  29,  pp.  303-11.     (March,  1905.) 
*Palmer,  A.  E.     The  New  York  Public  School  System. 
*Reigart,  J.  F.     The  Lancastrian  System  of  Instruction  in  the  Schools  of 

New  York  City. 
*Salmon,  David.    Joseph  Lancaster.    . 
*Simcoe,  A.  M.    Social  Forces  in  American  History.- 


CHAPTER  XXVI 

THE  AMERICAN  BATTLE  FOR  FREE  STATE  SCHOOLS 

The  problem  which  confronted  those  interested  in  establishing 
state-controlled  schools  was  not  exactly  the  same  in  any  two 
States,  though  the  battle  in  many  States  possessed  common  ele- 
ments, and  hence  was  somewhat  similar  in  character.  Instead 
of  tracing  the  struggle  in  detail  in  each  of  the  different  States,  it 
will  be  much  more  profitable  for  our  purposes  to  pick  out  the 
main  strategic  points  in  the  contest,  and  then  illustrate  the  con- 
flict for  these  by  describing  conditions  in  one  or  two  States  where 
the  controversy  was  most  severe  or  most  typical.  The  seven 
strategic  points  in  the  struggle  for  free,  tax-supported,  non-sec- 
tarian, state-controlled  schools  in  the  United  States  were: 

1.  The  battle  for  tax  support. 

2.  The  battle  to  eliminate  the  pauper-school  idea. 

3.  The  battle  to  make  the  schools  entirely  free. 

4.  The  battle  to  establish  state  supervision. 

5.  The  battle  to  eliminate  sectarianism. 

6.  The  battle  to  extend  the  system  upward. 

7.  Addition  of  the  state  university  to  crown  the  system. 

We  shall  consider  each  of  these,  briefly,  in  order. 

I.  THE  BATTLE  FOR  TAX  SUPPORT 

Early  support  and  endowment  funds.  In  New  England,  land 
endowments,  local  taxes,  direct  local  appropriations,  license  taxes, 
and  rate-bills  had  long  been  common.  Land  endowments  began 
early  in  the  New  England  Colonies,  while  rate-bills  date  back  to 
the  earliest  times  and  long  remained  a  favorite  means  of  raising 
money  for  school  support.  These  means  were  adopted  in  the 
different  States  after  the  beginning  of  our  national  period,  and  to 
them  were  added  a  variety  of  license  taxes,  while  occupational 
taxes,  lotteries,  and  bank  taxes  also  were  employed  to  raise  money 
for  schools.     A  few  examples  of  these  may  be  cited: 

Connecticut,  in  1774,  turned  over  all  proceeds  of  liquor  license^ 
to  the  towns  where  collected,  to  be  used  for  schools.  New  Or- 
leans, in  1826,  licensed  two  theaters  on  condition  that  they  each 
pay  $3000  annually  for  the  support  of  schools  in  the  city.  New 
York,  in  1799,  authorized  four  state  lotteries  to  raise  $100,000  for 


AMERICAN  BATTLE  FOR  FREE  SCHOOLS    371 

schools,  a  similar  amount  again  in  1801,  and  numerous  other  lot- 
teries before  18 10.  New  Jersey  (R.  246)  and  most  of  the  other 
States  did  the  same.  Congress  passed  fourteen  Joint  resolutions, 
between  181 2  and  1836,  authorizing  lotteries  to  help  support  the 
schools  of  the  city  of  Washington.  Bank  taxes  were  a  favorite 
source  of  income  for  schools,  between  about  1825  and  i860,  banks 
being  chartered  on  condition  that  they  would  pay  over  each  year 
for  schools  a  certain  sum  or  percentage  of  their  earnings.  These 
all  represent  what  is  known  as  indirect  taxation,  and  were  val- 
uable in  accustoming  the  people  to  the  idea  of  public  schools 
without  appearing  to  tax  them  for  their  support. 

The  National  Land  Grants,  begim  in  the  case  of  Ohio  in  1802, 
soon  stimulated  a  new  interest  in  schools.  Each  State  admitted 
after  Ohio  also  received  the  sixteenth  section  for  the  support  of 
common  schools,  and  two  townships  of  land  for  the  endowment  of 
a  state  university.  The  new  Western  States,  following  the  lead 
of  Ohio  (R.  260)  and  Indiana  (R.  261),  dedicated  these  section 
lands  and  funds  to  free  common  schools.  The  sixteen  older 
States,  however,  did  not  share  in  these  grants,  so  most  of  them 
now  set  about  building  up  a  permanent  school  fund  of  their  own, 
though  at  first  without  any  very  clear  idea  as  to  how  the  income 
from  the  fund  was  to  be  used. 

The  beginnings  of  school  taxation.  The  early  idea,  which 
seems  for  a  time  to  have  been  generally  entertained,  that  the  in- 
come from  land  grants,  license  fees,  and  these  permanent  endow- 
ment funds  would  in  time  entirely  support  the  necessary  schools, 
was  gradually  abandoned  as  it  was  seen  how  httle  in  yearly  in- 
come these  funds  and  lands  really  produced,  and  how  rapidly  the 
population  of  the  States  was  increasing.  By  1825  it  may  be  said 
to  have  been  clearly  recognized  by  thinking  men  that  the  only 
safe  reliance  of  a  system  of  state  schools  lay  in  the  general  and  di- 
rect taxation  of  all  property  for  their  support.  "The  wealth  of 
the  State  must  educate  the  children  of  the  State"  became  a 
watchword,  and  the  battle  for  direct,  local,  county,  and  state 
taxation  for  education  was  clearly  on  by  1825  to  1830  in  all  the 
Northern  States,  except  the  four  in  New  England  where  the  prin- 
ciple of  taxation  for  education  had  for  long  been  estabHshed. 
Even  in  these  States  the  struggle  to  increase  taxation  and  provide 
better  schools  called  for  much  argument  and  popular  education 
(R.  316),  and  occasional  backward  movements  (Rs.  317,  318) 
were  encountered. 


372       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


Fig.  90.  The  First  Free  Public 
School  in  Detroit 

A  one-room  school,  opened  in  .the  Second  Ward, 
in  1838.  No  action  was  taken  in  any  other 
ward  until  1842. 


The  struggle  to  secure  the  first  legislation,  weak  and  ineffective 
as  it  seems  to  us  to-day,  was  often  hard  and  long.     "Campaigns 

of  education"  had  to  be 
prepared  for  and  carried 
through.  Many  thought 
that  tax-supported  schools 
would  be  dangerous  for 
the  State,  harmful  to  in- 
dividual good,  and  thor- 
oughly undemocratic. 
Many  did  not  see  the  need 
for  schools  at  all.  Por- 
tions of  a  town  or  a  city 
would  provide  a  free 
school,  while  other  por- 
tions would  not.  Often 
those  in  favor  of  taxation 
were  bitterly  assailed,  and  even  at  times  threatened  with  per- 
sonal violence.  Often  those  in  favor  of  improving  the  schools 
had  to  wait  patiently  for  the  opposition  slowly  to  wear  itself  out 
(R.  319)  before  any  real  progress  could  be  made. 

State  support  fixed  the  state  system.  With  the  beginnings  of 
state  aid  in  any  substantial  sums,  either  from  the  income  from 
permanent  endowment  funds,  state  appropriations,  or  direct  state 
taxation,  the  State  became,  for  the  first  time,  in  a  position  to  en- 
force quite  definite  requirements  in  many  matters.  Communi- 
ties which  would  not  meet  the  State's  requirements  would  receive 
no  state  funds. 

One  of  the  first  requirements  to  be  thus  enforced  was  that  com- 
munities or  districts  receiving  state  aid  must  also  levy  a  local  tax 
for  schools.  Commonly  the  requirement  was  a  duplication  of 
state  aid.  The  next  step  in  state  control  was  to  add  still  other 
requirements,  as  a  prerequisite  to  receiving  state  aid.  One  of  the 
first  of  such  was  that  a  certain  length  of  school  term,  commonly 
three  months,  must  be  provided  in  each  school  district.  Another 
was  the  provision  of  free  heat,  and  later  on  free  schoolbooks  and 
supplies. 

When  the  duplication-of-state-aid-received  stage  had  been 
reached,  compulsory  local  taxation  for  education  had  been  estab- 
lished, and  the  great  central  battle  for  the  creation  of  a  state 
school  system  had  been  won.    The  right  to  tax  for  support,  and  to 


AMERICAN  BATTLE  FOR  FREE  SCHOOLS     373 

compel  local  taxation,  was  the  key  to  the  whole  state  system  of 
education.  From  this  point  on  the  process  of  evolving  an  ade- 
quate system  of  school  support  in  any  State  has  been  merely  the 
further  education  of  pubHc  opinion  to  see  new  educational  needs. 

II.  THE  BATTLE  TO  ELIMINATE  THE  PAUPER-SCHOOL  IDEA 

The  pauper-school  idea.  The  pauper-school  idea  was  a  direct 
inheritance  from  England,  and  its  home  in  America  was  in  the 
old  Central  and  Southern  Colonies,  where  the  old  Anglican 
Church  had  been  in  control.  New  Jersey,  Pennsylvania,  Dela- 
ware, Maryland,  Virginia,  and  Georgia  were  the  chief  representa- 
tives, though  the  idea  had  friends  among  certain  classes  of  the 
population  in  other  of  the  older  States.  The  new  and  democratic 
West  would  not  tolerate  it.  The  pauper-school  conception  was  a 
direct  inheritance  from  English  rule,  belonged  to  a  society  based 
on  classes,  and  was  wholly  out  of  place  in  a  Republic  founded  on 
the  doctrine  that  "all  men  are  created  equal,  and  endowed  by 
their  Creator  with  certain  unalienable  rights."  Still  more,  it  was 
a  very  dangerous  conception  of  education  for  a  democratic  form 
of  government  to  tolerate  or  to  foster.  Its  friends  were  found 
among  the  old  aristocratic  or  conservative  classes,  the  heavy  tax- 
payers, the  supporters  of  church  schools,  and  the  proprietors  of 
private  schools.  Citizens  who  had  caught  the  spirit  of  the  new 
Republic,  public  men  of  large  vision,  intelligent  workingmen,  and 
men  of  the  New  England  type  of  thinking  were  opposed  on  prin- 
ciple to  a  plan  which  drew  such  invidious  distinctions  between  the 
future  citizens  of  the  State.  To  educate  part  of  the  children  in 
church  or  private  pay  schools,  they  said,  and  to  segregate  those 
too  poor  to  pay  tuition  and  educate  them  at  public  expense  in 
pauper  schools,  often  with  the  brand  of  pauper  made  very  evident 
to  them,  was  certain  to  create  classes  in  society  which  in  time 
would  prove  a  serious  danger  to  our  democratic  institutions. 

The  battle  for  the  elimination  of  the  pauper-school  idea  was 
fought  out  in  the  North  in  the  States  of  Pennsylvania  and  New 
Jersey,  and  the  struggle  in  these  two  States  we  shall  now  briefly 
describe. 

The  Pennsylvania  legislation.  In  Pennsylvania  we  find  the 
pauper-school  idea  fully  developed.  The  constitution  of  1790 
(R.  259)  had  provided  for  a  state  system  of  pauper  schools,  but 
nothing  was  done  to  carry  even  this  constitutional  direction 
into  effect  until  1802.     A  pauper-school  law  was  then  enacted, 


374       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

directing  the  overseers  of  the  poor  to  notify  such  parents  as 
they  deemed  sufficiently  indigent  that,  if  they  would  declare 
theffi5eliz£s  to  be_paupers,  their  children  might  be  sent  to  some 
specified  private  or  pay  school  and  be  given  free  education  (R. 
315).  The  expense  for  this  was  assessed  against  the  education 
poor-fund,  which  was  levied  and  collected  in  the  same  manner  as 
were  road  taxes  or  taxes  for  poor  relief.  No  provision  was  made 
for  the  establishment  of  public  schools,  even  for  the  children  of  the 
poor,  nor  was  any  standard  set  for  the  education  to  be  provided  in 
the  schools  to  which  they,  were  sent.  No  other  general  provision 
for  elementary  education  was  made  in  the  State  until  1834. 

With  the  growth  of  the  cities,  and  the  rise  of  their  special  prob- 
lems, something  more  than '  this  very  inadequate  prQvision  for 
schooling  became  necessary.  "The  Philadelphia  Society  for  the 
Establishment  and  Support  of  Charity  Schools"  had  long  been 
urging  a  better  system,  and  in  1814  "The  Society  for  the  Promo- 
tion of  a  Rational  System  of  Education"  was  organized  in  Phila- 
delphia for  the  purpose  of  educational  propaganda.  Bills  were 
prepared  and  pushed,  and  in  1818  Philadelphia  was  permitted,  by 
special  law,  to  organize  as  "the  first  school  district"  in  the  State 
of  Pennsylvania,  and  to  provide,  with  its  own  funds,  a  system  of 
Lancastrian  schools  for  the  education  of  the  children  of  its  poor. 

The  Law  of  1834.  In  1827  "The  Pennsylvania  Society  for  the 
Promotion  of  Public  Schools"  began  an  educational  propaganda, 
which  did  much  to  bring  about  the  Free-School  Act  of  1834. 
Memorials  were  presented  to  the  legislature  year  after  year,  gov- 
ernors were  interested,  "Addresses  to  the  Public"  were  prepared, 
and  a  vigorous  propaganda  was  kept  up  until  the  Free-School 
Law  of  1834  was  the  result. 

This  law,  though,  was  optional.  It  created  every  ward,  town- 
ship, and  borough  in  the  State  a  school  district,  a  total  of  9S7  be- 
ing created  for  the  State.  Each  school  district  was  ordered  to 
vote  that  autumn  on  the  acceptance  or  rejection  of  the  law:. 
Those  accepting  the  law  were  to  organize  under  its  provisions, 
while  those  rejecting  the  .la^  were  to  continue  under  the  educa- 
tional provisions  of  the  old  Pauper-School  Act. 

In  the  school  elections  of  1834,  of  a  total  of  987  districts  created, 
502,  in  46  of  the  then  52  counties  (Philadelphia  County  not  vot- 
ing), or  52  per  cent  of  the  whole  number,  voted  to  accept  the  new 
law  and  organize  under  it;  264  districts,  in  31  counties,  or  27  per 
cent  of  the  whole,  voted  definitely  to  reject  the  law;  and  221  dis- 


AMERICAN  BATTLE  FOR  FREE  SCHOOLS    375 

tricts,  in  46  counties,  or  21  per  cent  of  the  whole,  refused  to  take 
any  action  either  way.  In  3  counties  every  district  accepted 
the  law,  and  in  5  counties  every  district  rejected  or  refused  to  act 
on  the  law.  It  was  the  predominantly  German  counties,  located 
in  the  east-central  portion  of  the  State,  which  were  strongest  in 
their  opposition  to  the  new  law.  One  reason  for  this  was  that  the 
new  law  provided  for  English  schools;  another  was  the  objection 
of  the  thrifty  Germans  to  taxation;  and  another  was  the  fear  that 
the  new  state  schools  might  injure  their  German  parochial 
schools. 

The  real  fight  for  free  verstcs  pauper  schools,  though,  was  yet 
to  come.  Legslatprs  who  had  voted  for  the  law  were  bitterly  as- 
sailed, and,  though  it  was  but  an  optional  law,  the  question  of  its 
repeal  and  the  reinstatement  of  the  old  Pauper-School  Law  be- 
came the  burning  issue  of  the  campaign  in  the  autumn  of  1834. 
Many  legislators  who  had  favored  the  law  were  defeated  for  re-_ 
election.  Others,  seeing  defeat,  refused  to  run.  Petitions  for  the 
repeal  of  the  law,  and  remonstrances  against  its  repeal,  flooded 
the  legislature  when  it  met.  The  Senate  at  once  repealed  the 
law,  but  the  House,  largely  under  the  leadership  of  a  Vermonter 
by  the  name  of  Thaddeus  Sitevens,  refused  to  reconsider,  and 
finally  forced  the  Senate  to  accept  an  amended  and  a  still 
stronger  bill.  This  defeat  finally  settled,  in  principle  at  least, 
the  pauper-school  question  in  Pennsylvania,  though  it  was  not 
until  1873  that  the  last  district  in  the  State  accepted  the  new 
system. 

Eliminating  the  pauper-school  idea  in  New  Jersey.  No  con- 
stitutional mention  of  education  was  made  in  New  Jersey  until 
1844,  and  no  educational  legislation  was  passed  until  181 6.  In 
that  year  a  permanent  state  school  fund  was  begun,  and  in  1820 
the  first  permission  to  leyyjaxes  "for  the  education  of  such  poor 
children  as  are  paupers"  was  granted.  In  1828  an  extensive  in- 
vesti^tion  showed  that  one  third  of  the  children  of  the  State 
were  without  educational  opportunities,  and  as  a  result  of  this  in- 
vestigation the  first  general  school  law  for  the  State  was  enacted, 
in  1825.  This  provided  for  district  schools,  school  trustees 
and  visitation,  licensed  teachers,  local  taxation,  and  made  a 
state  appropriation  of  $20,000  a  year  to  help  establish  the  sys- 
tem. The  next  year,  however,  this  law  was  repealed  and  the  old 
pauper-school  plan  reestablished,  largely  due  to  the  pressure  of 
church  and  private-school  interest^.    In  1830  and  1831  the  state 


376       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

appropriation  was  made  divisible  among  private  and  parochial 
schools,  as  well  as  the  public  pauper  schools,  and  the  use  of  all 
public  money  was  limited  "to  the  education  of  the  children  of  the 
poor." 

Between  1828  and  1838  a  number  of  conventions  of  friends  of 
free  public  schools  were  held  in  the  State,  and  much  work  in  the 
nature  of  propaganda  was  done.  At  a  convention  in  1838  a  com- 
mittee was  appointed  to  prepare  an  "Address  to  the  People  of 
New  Jersey"  on  the  educational  needs  of  the  State  (R.  320),  and 
speakers  were  sent  over  the  State  to  talk  to  the  people  on  the  sub- 
ject. The  campaign  against  the  pauper  school  had  Just  been 
fought  to  a  conclusion  in  Pennsylvania,  and  the  result  of  the  ap- 
peal in  New  Jersey  was  such  a  popular  manifestation  in  favor  of 
free  schools  that  the  legislature  of  1838  instituted  a  partial  state 
school  system.  The  pauper-school  laws  were  repealed,  and  the 
best  features  of  the  short-lived  Law  of  1829  were  reenacted.  In 
1844  a  new  state  constitution  limited  the  income  of  the  per- 
manent state  school  fund  exclusively  to  the  support  of  public 
schools. 

With  the  pauper-school  idea  eliminated  from  Pennsylvania  and 
New  Jersey,  the  North  was  through  with  it.  The  wisdom  of  its 
elimination  soon  became  evident,  and  we  hear  little  more  of  it 
among  Northern  people.  The  democratic  West  never  tolerated 
it.  It  continued  some  time  longer  in  Maryland,  Virginia,  and 
Georgia,  and  at  places  for  a  time  in  other  Southern  States,  but 
finally  disappeared  in  the  South  as  well  in  the  educational  reor^ 
ganizations  which  took  place  following  the  close  of  the  Civil  War. 

III.  THE  BATTLE  TO  MAKE  THE  SCHOOLS  ENTIRELY  FREE* 

The  schools  not  yet  free.  The  rate-bill,  as  we  have  previously 
stated,  was  an  old  institution,  also  brought  over  from  England,  as 
the  term  "  rate  "  signifies.  It  was  a  charge  levied  upon  the  parent 
to  supplement  the  school  revenues  and  prolong  the  school  terrn^ 
and  was  assessed  in  proportion  to  the  number  of  children  sent  by 
each  parent  to  the  school.  In  some  States,  as  for  example  Massa- 
chusetts and  Connecticut,  its  use  went  back  to  colonial  times;  m 
others  it  was  added  as  the  cost  for  education  increased,  and  it  was 
seen  that  the  income  from  permanent  funds  and  authorized  taxa- 
tion was  not  sufficient  to  maintain  the  school  the  necessary  length 
of  time.  The  deficiency  in  revenue  was  charged  against  the  par- 
ents sending  children  to  school,  pro  rata,  and  collected  as  ordi- 


AMERICAN  BATTLE  FOR  FREE  SCHOOLS    377 

nary  tax-bills  (R.  321).  The  charge  was  small,  but  it  was  suffi- 
"cient  toTeep  many  poqr_children  away  from  the  schools. 

The  rising  cities,  with  their  new  social  problems,  could  not  and 
would  not  tolerate  the  rate-bill  system,  and  one  by  one  they  se- 
cured special  laws  from  legislatures  which  enabled  them  to  organ- 
ize a  city  school  system,  separate  from  city-council  control,  and 
under  a  local  "board  of  education,"  One  of  the  provisions  of 
these  special  laws  nearly  always  was  the  right  to  levy  a  city  tax 
for  schools  sufficient  to  provide  free  education  for  the  children  of 
the  city. 

The  fight  against  the  rate-bill  in  New  York.  The  attempt  to 
abolish  the  rate-bill  and  make  the  schools  wholly  free  was  most 
vigorously  contested  in  New  York  State,  and  the  contest  there  is 
most  easily  described.  While  the  wealt]iyLdistricts  were  securing 
special  legislation  and  taxing  themselves  to  provide  free  schools 
for  their  children,  the  poorer  and  less  populous  districts  were  left 
to  struggle  to  maintain  their  schools  the  four  months  each  year 
necessary  to  secure  state  aid.  Finally,  after  much  agitation,  and 
a  number  of  appeals  to  the  legislature  to  assume  the  rate-bill 
charges  in  the  form  of  general  state  taxation,  and  thus  make  the 
schools  entirely  free,  the  legislature,  in  1849,  referred  the  matter 
back  to  the  people  to  be  voted  on  at  thTelections  that  autumn. 
The  legislature  was  to  be  thus  advised  by  the  people  as  to  what 
action  it  should  take.  The  result  was  a  state-wide  campaign  for 
free,  public,  tax-supported  schools,  as  against  partially  free,  rate- 
bill  schools. 

The  result  of  the  1849  election  was  a  vote  of  249,872  in  favor  of 
making  "the  prop^erty  of  the  State  educate  the  children  of  the 
State,"  and  91,952  against  it.  This  only  seemed  to  stir  the  op- 
p^aients  of  free  schools  to  renewed  action,  and  they  induced  the 
next  legislature  to  resubmit  the  question  for  another  vote,  in 
1850.  The  opponents  of  tax- supported  schools  now  mustered 
their  full  strength,  doubling  their  vote  in  1849,  while  the  majority 
for  free  schools  was  materially  cut  down. 

The  rate-bill  in  other  States.  These  two  referenda  virtually 
settled  the  question  in  New  York,  though  for  a  time  a  compro- 
mise was  adopted.  The  state^^ropriation  for  schools  was  very 
materially  increased,  the  rate-bill  was  retained,  and  the  organiza- 
tion of  "union  districts"  to  provide  free  schools  by  local  taxation 
where  people  desired  them  was  authorized.  Many^oF  tliese 
"union  free  districts"  now  arose  in  the  more  progressive  com- 


S7S       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

munities  of  the  State,  and  finally,  in  1867,  after  rural  and  other 
forms  of  opposition  had  largely  subsided,  and  after  almost  all  the 
older  States  had  abandoned  the  plan,  the  New  York  legislature 
finally  abolished  the  rate-bill  and  made  the  schools  entirely  free. 
The  New  York  fight  of  1849  and  1850  was  the  pivotal  fight;  in 
the  other  States  it  was  abandoned  by  legislative  act,  and  without 
a  serious  contest.  In  the  Southern  States  free  education  came 
with  the  educational  reorganizations  following  the  close  of  the 
Civil  War. 

IV.  THE  BATTLE  TO  ESTABLISH  SCHOOL  SUPERVISION 

Beginnings  of  state  control.  The  great  battle  for  state  schools 
was  not  only  for  taxation  to  stimulate  their  development  where 
none  existed,  but  was  also  indirectly  a  battle  for  some  form  of 
state  control  of  the  local  systems  which  had  already  grown  up. 

State  oversight  and  control,  however,  does  not  exercise  itself, 
and  it  soon  became  evident  that  the  States  must  elect  or  appoint 
some  ofl&cer  to  represent  the  State  and  enforce  the  observance  of 
its  demands.  It  would  be  primarily  his  duty  to  see  that  the  laws 
relating  to  schools  were  carried  out,  that  statistics  as  to  existing 
conditions  were  collected  and  printed,  and  that  communities 
were  properly  advised  as  to  their  duties  and  the  legislature  as  to 
the  needs  of  the  State.  We  find  now  the  creation  of  a  series  of 
school  officers  to  represent  the  State,  the  enactment  of  new  laws 
extending  control,  and  a  struggle  to  integrate,  subordinate,  and 
reduce  to  some  semblance  of  a  state  school  system  the  hundreds 
of  little  community  school  systems  which  had  grown  up. 

The  first  state  school  officers.  The  first  American  State  to 
create  a  state  officer  to  exercise  supervision  over  its  schools  was 
New  York,  in  181 2.  In  enacting  the  new  law  providing  for  state 
aid  for  schools  the  first  State  Superintendent  of  Common  Schools 
in  the  United  States  was  created.  So  far  as  is  known  this  was  a 
distinctively  American  creation,  uninfluenced  by  the  practice  in 
any  other  land.  It  was  to  be  the  duty  of  this  officer  to  look  after 
the  establishment  and  maintenance  of  the  schools  throughout  the 
State.  Maryland  created  the  office  in  1826,  but  two  years  later 
aboHshed  it  and  did  not  re-create  it  until  1864.  Illinois  directed 
its  Secretary  of  State  to  act,  ex  officio,  as  Superintendent  of 
Schools  in  1825,  as  did  also  Vermont  in  1827,  Louisiana  in  1833, 
Pennsylvania  in  1834,  and  Tennessee  in  1835.  Illinois  did  not 
create  a  real  State  Superintendent  of  Schools,  though,  until  1854, 


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AMERICAN  BATTLE  FOR  FREE  SCHOOLS     379 

Vermont  until  1845,  Louisiana  until  1847,  Pennsylvania  until 
1857,  or  Tennessee  until  1867.  The  first  States  to  create  separate 
school  officials  who  have  been  continued  to  the  present  time  were 
Michigan  and  Kentucky,  both  in  1837.  Often  quite  a  legislative 
struggle  took  place  to  secure  the  establishment  of  the  office,  and 
later  on  to  prevent  its  abolition. 

By  1850  there  were  ex-qfficio  state  school  officers  in  nine  and 
regular  school  officers  in  seven  of  the  then  thirty-one  States,  and 
by  1 86 1  there  were  ex-officio  officers  in  nine  and  regular  officers  in 
nineteen  of  the  then  thirty-four  States,  as  well  as  one  of  each  in 
two  of  the  organized  Territories.  Ten  of  the  thirty-four  States 
had,  by  1861,  also  created  the  office  of  County  Superintendent  of 
Schools.  Twenty-five  cities  also  had,  by  1861,  created  the  office 
of  City  Superintendent  of  Schools.  Only  three  more  cities  — 
Albany,  Washington,  and  Kansas  City  —  were  added  before  1870, 
making  a  total  of  twenty-eight,  but  since  that  date  the  number 
of  city  superintendents  has  increased  to  something  like  fourteen 
hundred  to-day. 

The  first  State  Board  of  Education.  Another  important  form 
for  state  control  which  was  created  a  little  later  was  the  State 
Board  of  Education,  with  an  appointed  Secretary,  who  exercised 
about  the  same  functions  as  a  State  Superintendent  of  Schools. 
This  form  of  organization  first  arose  in  Massachusetts,  in  1837,  in 
an  effort  to  subordinate  the  district  schools  and  reduce  them  to  a 
semblance  of  an  organized  system.  Instead  of  following  the  usual 
American  practice  of  the  time,  and  providing  for  an  elected  State 
School  Superintendent,  Massachusetts  provided  for  a  small  ap- 
pointed State  Board  of  EducatioiL which  in  turn  was  to  select  a 
Secretary,  who  was  to  act  in  the  capacity  of  a  state  school  officer 
and  report  to  the  Board,  and  through  it  to  the  legislature  and 
the  people.  Neither  the  Board  nor  the  Secretary  were  given  any 
powers  of  compulsion,  their  work  being  to  investigate  conditions, 
report  facts,  expose  defects,  and  make  recommendations  as  to 
action  to  the  legislature.  The  permanence  and  influence  of  the 
Board  thus  depended  very  largely  on  the  character  of  the  Secre- 
tary it  selected. 

Horace  Mann  the  first  Secretary.  A  prominent  Brown  Univer- 
sity graduate  and  lawyer  in  the  State  Senate,  by  the  name  of 
Horace  Mann  (i 796-1859),  who  as  president  of  the  Senate  had 
been  of  much  assistance  in  securing  passage  of  the  bill  creating  the 
State  Board  of  Education,  was  finally  induced  by  the  Governor 


38o       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

and  the  Board  to  accept  the  position  of  Secretary.  Mr.  Mann 
now  began  a  most  memorable  work  of  educating  public  opinion, 
and  soon  became  the  acknowledged  leader  in  school  organization 
in  the  United  States,  State  after  State  called  upon  him  for  ad- 
vice and  counsel,  while  his  twelve  annual  Reports  to  the  State 
Board  of  Education  will  always  remain  memorable  documents. 
Public  men  of  all  classes  —  lawyers,  clergymen,  college  professors, 
literary  men,  teachers  —  were  laid  under  tribute  and  sent  forth 
over  the  State  explaining  to  the  people  the  need  for  a  reawakening 
of  educational  interest  in  Massachusetts.  Every  year  Mr.  Mann 
organized  a  "campaign,"  to  explain  to  the  people  the  meaning  and 
importance  of  general  education.  So  successful  was  he,  and  so 
ripe  was  the  time  for  such  a  movement,  that  he  not  only  started  a 
great  common  school  revival  in  Massachusetts  which  led  to  the 
regeneration  of  the  schools  there,  but  one  which  was  felt  and 
which  influenced  development  in  every  Northern  State. 

His  twelve  carefully  written  Reports  on  the  condition  of  educa- 
tion  in  Massachusetts  and  elsewhere,  with  his  intelligent  discus- 
sion of  the  aims  and  purposes  of  public  education,  occupy  a  com- 
manding place  in  the  history  of  American  education,  while  he 
will  always  be  regarded  as  perhaps  the  greatest  of  the  "founders" 
of  our  American  system  of  free  public  schools.  No  one  did  more 
than  he  to  establish  in  the  minds  of  the  American  people  the  con- 
ception that  education  should  be  universal,  non-sectarian,  and 
free,  and  that  its  aim  should  be  social  efficiency,  civic  virtue,  and 
character,  rather  than  mere  learning  or  the  advancement  of  sec- 
tarian  ends.  Under  his  practical  leadership  an  unorganized  and 
heterogeneous  series  of  community  school  systems  was  reduced  to 
organization  and  welded  together  into  a  state  school  system,  and 
the  people  of  Massachusetts  were  effectively  recalled  to  their  an- 
cient belief  in  and  duty  toward  the  education  of  the  people. 

Henry  Barnard  in  Connecticut  and  Rhode  Island.  Almost 
equally  important,  though  of  a  somewhat  different  character, 
was  the  work  of  Henry  Barnard  (1811-1900)  in  Connecticut  and 
Rhode  Island.  A  graduate  of  Yale,  and  also  educated  for  the 
Jaw,  he  turned  aside  to  teach  and  became  deeply  interested  in 
education.  The  years  1835-37  he  spent  in  Europe  studying 
spools,  particularly  the  work  of  Pestalozzi's  disciples.  On  his 
return  to  America  he  was  elected  a  member  of  the  Connecticut 
legislature,  and  at  once  formulated  and  secured  passage  of  the 
Connecticut  law  (1839)  providing  for  a  State  Board  of  Commis« 


AMERICAN  BATTLE  FOR  FREE  SCHOOLS    381 

sioners  for  Common  Schools,  with  a  Secretary,  after  the  Massa- 
chusetts plan.  Mr.  Barnard  was  then  elected  as  its  first  Secre- 
tary, and  reluctantly  gave  up  the  law  and  accepted  the  position  at 
the  munificent  salary^^LS3  a  day  and  expenses.  Until  the  legis- 
lature abolished  both  the  Board  and  the  position,  in  1842,  he  ren- 
dered for  Connecticut  a  service  scarcely  less  important  than  the 
better-known  reforms  which  Horace  Mann  was  at  that  time  car- 
rying on  in  Massachusetts. 

In  1843  he  was  called  to  Rhode  Island  to  examine  and  report 
upon  the  existing  schools,  and  from  1845  to  1849  acted  as  State 
Commissioner  of  Public  Schools  there,  where  he  rendered  a  serv^- 
ice  similar  to  that  previously  rendered  in  Connecticut.  In  addi- 
tion he  organized  a  series  of  town  libraries  throughout  the  State. 
For  his  teachers'  institutes  he  devised  a  traveling  mpdeL^chool,  to 
give  demonstration  lessons  in  the  art  of  teaching.  From  185 1  to 
1855  he  was  again  in  Connecticut,  as  principal  of  the  newly  estab- 
lished state  normal  school  and  ex-officio  Secretary  of  the  Connec- 
ticut State  Board  of  Education.  He  now  rewrote  the  school 
laws,  increased  taxation  for  schools,  checked  the  power  of  the  dis- 
tricts, there  known  as  "school  societies,"  and  laid  the  foundations 
of  a  state  system  of  schools.  The  work  of  Mann  and  Barnard  had 
its  influence  throughout  all  the  NortheiiLJStaies,  and  encouraged 
the  friends  of  education  everywhere.  Almost  contemporaneous 
with  them  were  leaders  in  other  States  who  helped  fight  through 
the  battles  of  state  establishment  and  state  organization  and  con- 
trol, and  the  period  of  their  labors  has  since  been  termed  the 
period  of  the  "great  awakening." 


^0 


,V.  THE  BATTLE  TO  ELIMINATE  SECTARIANISM 


The  secularization  of  American  education.  The  Church,  it 
will  be  remembered,  was  from  the  earliest  colonial  times  in  posses- 
sion of  the  education  of  the  young.  Not  only  were  the  earliest 
schools  controlled  by  the  Church  and  dominated  by  the  religious 
motive,  but  the  right  of  the  Church  to  dictate  the  teaching  in  the 
schools  was  clearly  recognized  by  the  State.  Still  more,  the  State 
looked  to  the  Church  to  provide  the  necessary  education,  and  as- 
sisted it  in  doing  so  by  donations  of  land  and  money.  The  minis- 
ter, as  a  town  ofiicial,  naturally  examined  the  teachers  and  the  in- 
struction in  the  schools.  After  the  establishment  of  the  National 
Government  this  relationship  for  a  time  continued.  New  York 
and  the  New  England  States  specifically  set  aside  lands  to  help 


382        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

both  church  and  school.  After  about  1800  these  land  endow- 
ments for  religion  ceased,  but  grants  of  state  aid  for  religious 
schools  continued  for  nearly  a  half-century  longer.  Then  it  be- 
came common  for  a  town  or  city  to  build  a  schoolhouse  from  city 
taxation,  and  let  it  out  rent-free  to  any  responsible  person  who 
would  conduct  a  tuition  school  in  it,  with  a  few  free  places  for  se- 
lected poor  children.  Still  later,  with  the  rise  of  the  state  schools, 
it  became  quite  common  to  take  over  church  and  private  schools 
and  aid  them  on  the  same  basis  as  the  new  state  schools. 

In  colonial  times,  too,  and  for  some  decades  into  our  national 
period,  the  warmest  advocates  of  the  establishment  of  schools 
were  those  who  had  in  view  the  needs  of  the  Church.  Then  grad- 
ually the  emphasis  shifted  to  the  needs  of  the  State,  and  a  new 
class  of  advocates  of  pubHc  education  now  arose.  This  change 
's  known  as  the"  secularization  of  American  education.  It  also 
required  many  a  bitter  struggle,  and  was  accomplished  in  the 
different  States  but  slowly. 

The  fight  in  Massachusetts.  The  educational  awakening  in 
Massachusetts,  brought  on  largely  by  the  work  of  Horace  Mann, 
was  to  many  a  rude  awakening.  Among  other  things,  it  re- 
vealed that  the  old  school  of  the  Puritans  had  gradually  been  re- 
placed by  a  new  and  purely  American  type  of  school,  with  instruc- 
tion adapted  to  democratic  and  national  rather  than  religious 
ends.  Mr.  Mann  stood  strongly  for  such  a  conception  of  public 
education,  and  being  a  Unitarian,  and  the  new  State  Board  of 
Education  being  almost  entirely  liberal  in  religion,  an  attack  was 
launched  against  them,  and  for  the  first  time  in  our  history  the 
cry  was  raised  that  "The  pubUc  schools  are  Godless  schools." 
Those  who  believed  in  the  old  system  of  religious  instruction, 
those  who  bore  the  Board  or  its  Secretary  personal  ill-will,  and 
those  who  desired  to  break  down  the  Board's  authority  and  stop 
the  development  of  the  public  schools,  united  their  forces  in  this 
first  big  attack  against  secular  education.  Horace  Mann  was  the 
first  prominent  educator  in  America  to  meet  and  answer  the  re- 
ligious onslaught. 

A  violent  attack  was  opened  in  both  the  pulpit  and  the  press. 
It  was  claimed  that  the  Board  was  trying  to  eliminate  the  Bible 
from  the  schools,  to  abolish  correction,  and  to  "make  the  schools 
a  counterpoise  to  religious  instruction  at  home  and  in  Sabbath 
schools."  The  local  right  to  demand  religious  instruction  was  in- 
sisted upon. 


AMERICAN  BATTLE  FOR  FREE  SCHOOLS      383 

Mr.  Mann  felt  that  a  great  public  issue  had  been  raised  which 
should  be  answered  carefully  and  fully.  In  three  public  state- 
ments he  answered  the  criticisms  and  pointed  out  the  errors  in  the 
argument  (R.  322).  The  Bible,  he  said,  was  an  invaluable  book 
for  forming  the  character  of  children,  and  should  be  read  without 
comment  in  the  schools,  but  it  was  not  necessary  to  teach  it  there. 
He  showed  that  most  of  the  towns  had  given  up  the  teaching  of  the 
Catechism  before  the  establishment  of  the  Board  of  Education. 
He  contended  that  any  attempt  to  decide  what  cj-eed  or  doctrine 
should  be  taught  would  mean  the  ruin  of  the  schools.  The  attack 
culminated  in  the  attempts  of  the  religious  forces  to  aboHsh  the 
State  Board  of  Education,  in  the  legislatures  of  1840  and  1841, 
which  failed  dismally. 

The  attempt  to  divide  the  school  funds.  As  was  stated  earlier, 
in  the  beginning  it  was  common  to  aid  church  schools  on.the  same 
basis  as  the  state  schools,  and  sometimes,  in  the  beginnings  of 
state  aid,  the  money  was  distributed  among  e:^sting  schools  with- 
out at  first  estabHshing  any  public  schools.  In  many  Eastern 
cities  church  schools  at  first  shared  in  the  public  funds. 

After  the  beginning  of  the  forties,  when  the  Roman  Catholic  in- 
fluence came  in  strongly  with  the  increase  in  Irish  immigration  to 
the  United  States,  a  new  factor  was  introduced  and  the  problem, 
which  had  previously  been  a  Protestant  problem,  took  on  a  some- 
what different  aspect  in  the  form  of  a  demand  for  a  division  of  the 
school  funds.  Between  1825  and  1842  the  fight  was  especially 
severe  in  New  York  City.  In  1825  the  City  Council  refused  to 
grant  public  money  to  any  religious  Society,  and  in  1840  the 
Catholics  carried  the  matter  to  the  State  Legislature. 

The  legislature  deferred  action  until  1842,  and  then  did  the  un- 
expected thing.  The  heated  discussion  of  the  question  in  the  city 
and  in  the  legislature  had  made  it  evident  that,  while  it  might  not 
be  desirable  to  continue  to  give  funds  to  a  privately  organized 
corporation,  to  divide  them  among  the  quarreling  and  envious  re- 
ligious sects  would  be  much  worse.  The  result  was  that  the  legis- 
lature created  for  the  city  a  City  Board  of  Education,  to  establish 
real  public  schools,  and  stopped  the  debate  on  the  question  of  aid 
to  religious  schools  by  enacting  that  no  portion  of  the  school 
fimds  was  in  the  future  to  be  given  to  any  school  in  which  "any 
religious  sectarian  doctrine  or  tenet  should  be  taught,  inculcated, 
or  practiced."  Thus  the  real  public-school  system  of  New  York 
City  was  evolved  out  of  this  attempt  to  divide  the  public  funds 


384        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

among  the  churches.  The  Public  School  Society  continued  for  a 
time,  but  its  work  was  now  done,  and,  in  1853,  it  surrendered  its 
buildings  and  property  to  the  City  Board  of  Education  and  dis- 
banded. 

Mother  States  now  faced  similar  demands,  but  no  demand  for  a 
share  in  or  a  division  of  the  public-school  funds,  after  1840,  was 
successful.  The  demand  everywhere  met  with  intense  opposi- 
tion, and  with  the  coming  of  enormous  numbers  of  Irish  Catholics 
after  1846,  and  German  Lutherans  after  1848,  the  question  of  the 
preservation  of  the  schools  just  established  as  unified  state  school 
systems  now  became  a  burning  one.  Petitions  for  a  division  of 
the  funds  deluged  the  legislatures  (R.  323),  and  these  were  met  by 
counter-petitions  (R.  324).  Mass  meetings  on  both  sides  of  the 
question  were  held.  Candidates  for  office  were  forced  to  declare 
themselves.  Anti-Catholic  riots  occurred  in  a  number  of  cities. 
The  Native-American  Party  was  formed,  in  1841,  "  to  prevent  the 
union  of  Church  and  State,"  and  to  "keep  the  Bible  in  the 
schools."  In  1841  the  Whig  Party,  in  New  York,  inserted  a 
plank  in  its  platform  against  sectarian  schools.  In  1855  the  na- 
tional council  of  the  Know-Nothing  Party,  meeting  in  Philadel- 
phia, in  its  platform  favored  public  schools  and  the  use  of  the 
Bible  th^ein,  but  opposed  sectarian  schools.  This  party  carried 
the  elections  that  year  in  Massachusetts,  New  Hampshire,  Con- 
necticut, Rhode  Island,  Maryland,  and  Kentucky. 

To  settle  the  question  in  a  final  manner  legislatures  now  began 
to  propose  constitutional  amendments  to  the  people  of  their  sev.- 
eral  States  which  forbade  a  division  or  a  diversion  of  the  funds, 
and  these  were  almost  uniformly  adopted  at  the  first  election  after 
being  proposed.  No  State  admitted  to  the  Union  after  1858,  ex- 
cept West  Virginia,  failed  to  insert  such  a  provision  in  its  first  state 
constitution. 

VI.  THE  BATTLE  TO  ESTABLISH  THE  AMERICAN  HIGH  SCHOOL 

The  elementary  or  common  schools  which  had  been  established 
in  the  different  States,  by  1850,  supplied  an  elementary  or  com- 
mon school  education  to  the  children  of  the  masses  of  the  people, 
and  the  primary  schools  which  were  added  after  about  1820,  car- 
ried this  education  downward  to  the  needs  of  the  beginners.  In 
the  rural  schools  the  American  school  of  the  3  Rs  provided  for  all 
the  children,  from  the  little  ones  up,  so  long  as  they  could  ad- 
vantageously partake  of  its  instruction.     Education  in  advance 


AMERICAN  BATTLE  FOR  FREE  SCHOOLS    385 

of  this  common  school  training  was  in  semi-private  institutions  — 
the  academies  and  colleges  —  in  which  a  tuitioa  fee  was  charged. 
The  next  struggle  came  in  the  attempt  to  extend  the  system  up>- 
ward  so  as  to  provide  to  pupils,  free  of  charge,  a  more  complete 
education  than  the  common  schools  afforded. 

The  transition  Academy.  About  the  middle  of  the  ei^teenth 
century-  a  tendency  manifested  itself,  in  Europe  as  well  as  in 
America,  to  establish  higher  schools  offering  a  more  practical 
curriculum  than  the  old  Latin  schools  had  provided.  In  America 
it  became  particularly  evident,  after  the  coming  of  nationality, 
that  the  old  Latin  grammar-school  type  of  instruction,  with  its 
h'mited  curriculiun  and  exclusively  college-preparatory  ends,  was 
wholly  inadequate  for  the  needs  of  the  youth  of  the  land.  The 
result  was  the  gradual  d\ing  out  of  the  Latin  school  and  the 
evolution  of  the  tuition  Academy,  previously  referred  to  briefly 
on  page  248. 

The  academy  movement  spread  rapidly  during  the  first  half  of 
the  nineteenth  century.  By  1800  there  were  17  academies  in 
Massachusetts.  36  by  1820.  and  403  by  1850.  The  greatest  period 
of  their  development  was  from  1820  to  1830,  though  they  contin- 
ued to  dominate  secondary'  education  until  1850,  and  were  very 
prominent  until  after  the  Civil  War. 

One  of  the  main  purposes  expressed  in  the  endowment  or  crea- 
tion of  the  academies  was  the  establishment  of  courses  which 
should  cover  a  number  of  subjects  having  value  aside  from  mere 
preparation  for  college,  particularly  subjects  of  a  modem  nature, 
useful  in  preparing  youths  for  the  changed  conditions  of  society 
and  government  and  business.  The  study  of  real  things  rather 
than  words  about  things,  and  useful  things  rather  than  subjects 
merely  preparatory  to  college,  became  prominent  features  of  the 
new  courses  of  study.  Among  the  most  conungnly  found  new 
subjects  were  algebra,  astronomy,  botany,  chemistrj',  general  his- 
tory-, United  States  histor)',  English  Uterature.  surve>ing,  intellec- 
tual philosophy,  declamation,  and  debating.  Being  bmlt  upon 
instead  of  running  parallel  to  the  comnxoii-  school  course,  as  the 
old  Latin  grammar  school  had  done,  the  academies  clearly  mark 
a  transition  from  the  aristocratic  and  somewhat  exclusive  college- 
preparatory  Latin  grammar  school  of  colonial  times  to  the  more 
democratic  high  school  of  to-day.  The  academies  also  served 
a  very  useful  purpose  in  supplying  to  the  lower  schools  the  best- 
educated  teachers  of  the  time. 


386 


A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


The  demand  for  higher  schools.  The  different  movements 
tending  toward  the  building-up  of  free  public-school  systems  in  the 
cities  and  States,  which  we  have  described  in  this  and  the  preced- 
ing chapter,  and  which  became  clearly  defined  in  the  Northern 
States  after  1825,  came  just  at  the  time  when  the  Academy  had 


I  The  Latin  Grammar  School 


The  Tuition  Academy 

The  Free  Public  High  School 

(Proportional  heishts  indicate  estimated 
relative  development) 


12.000 


9,000 


8,000 


1630  1650 


1700 


1750 


1800 


1900    1916 


Fig.  91.  The  Development  of  Secondary  Schools  in 

THE  United  States 

The  transitional  character  of  the  Academy  is  well  shown  in  this  diagram. 

reached  its  maximum  development.  The  settlement  of  the  ques- 
tion of  general  taxation  for  education,  the  elimination  of  the  rate- 
bill  by  the  cities  and  later  by  the  States,  the  establishment  of  the 
American  cornmon  school  as  the  result  of  a  long  native  evolution, 
and  the  complete  establishment  of  public  control  over  the  entire 
elementar}'-school  system,  all  tended  to  bring  the  semi-private 
tuition  academy  into  question.  Many  asked  why  not  extend  the 
public-school  system  upward  to  provide  the  necessary  higher  edu- 
cation for  all  in  one  common  state-supported  school. 

The  demand  for  an  upward  extension  of  the  public  school, 
which  would  provide  academy  instruction  for  the  poor  as  well  as 
the  rich,  and  in  one  common  public  higher  school,  now  made  itself 
felt.  As  the  colonial  Latin  grammar  school  had  represented  the 
educational  needs  of  a  society  based  on  classes,  and  the  academies 
had  represented  a  transition  period  and  marked  the  growth  of  a 
middle  class,  so  the  rising  democracy  of  the  second  quarter  of  the 
nineteenth  century  now  demanded  and  obtained  the  democratic 


AMERICAN  BATTLE  FOR  FREE  SCHOOLS    387 


high  school,  supported  by  the  public  and  equally  open  to  all,  to 
meet  the  educational  needs  of  a  new  society  built  on  the  basis  of 
a  new  and  aggressive  democracy.  Where,  too,  the  academy  had 
represented  in  a  way  a  missionary  effort  —  that  of  a  few  pro- 
viding something  for  the  good  of  the  people  (Rs.  319,  325)  — 
the  high  school  on  the  other  hand  represented  a  cooperative 
effort  on  the  part  of  the  people  to  provide  something  for  them- 
selves. 

The  first  American  high  school.  The  first  high  school  in  the 
United  States  was  established  in  Boston,  in  1821  (R.  326).  For 
three  years  it  was  known  as  the  ''English  Classical  School" 
(R.  327),  but  in  1824  the  school  appears  in  the  records  as  the 
"English  High  School."  In  1826  Boston  also  opened  the  first 
high  school  for  girls,  but  abolished  it  in 
1828,  due  to  its  great  popularity,  and 
instead  extended  the  course  of  study  for 
girls  in  the  elementary  schools. 

The  Massachusetts  Law  of  1827. 
Though  Portland,  Maine,  established  a 
high  school  in  182 1,  Worcester,  Massa- 
chusetts, in  1824,  and  New  Bedford, 
Haverhill,  and  Salem,  Massachusetts,  in 
1827,  copying  the  Boston  idea,  the  real 
beginning  of  the  American  high  school 
as  a  distinct  institution  dates  from  the 
Massachusetts  Law  of  1827  (R.  328), 
enacted  through  the  influence  of  Tames  The  First  High  School  in 
r-    r-     4.  nZ-    ^        (  a   4.U     u     •  THE  United  States 

G.  Carter.     Ihis  law  formed  the  basis  ^^     . ,. ,    ,     „        .    „ 
.      ,,        ,  ,      .  ,     .         .     -,,  Established  at  Boston  in  182 1. 

of  all  subsequent  legislation  m  Massa- 
chusetts, and  deeply  influenced  development  in  other  States. 

This  Boston  and  Massachusetts  legislation  clearly  initiated  the 
public  high-school  movement  in  the  United  States.  It  was  there 
that  the  new  type  of  higher  school  was  founded,  there  that  its 
curriculum  was  outlined,  there  that  its  standards  were  established, 
and  there  that  it  developed  earliest  and  best. 

The  struggle  to  establish  and  maintain  high  schools.  In  many 
States,  legislation  providing  for  the  establishment  of  high  schools 
was  attacked  in  the  courts.  One  of  the  clearest  cases  of  this  came 
in  Michigan,  in  a  test  case  appealed  from  the  city  of  Kalamazoo, 
and  commonly  known  as  the  Kalamazoo  case.  The  opinion  of 
the  Supreme  Court  of  the  State  (R.  330)  was  so  favorable  and  so 


388        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

positive  that  this  decision  deeply  influenced  development  in 
almost  all  of  the  Upper  Mississippi  Valley  States. 

The  struggle  to  establish  and  maintain  high  schools  in  Massa- 
chusetts and  New  York  preceded  the  development  in  most  other 
States,  because  there  the  common  school  had  been  established 
earlier.  In  consequence,  the  struggle  to  extend  and  complete  the 
public-school  system  came  there  earlier  also.  The  development 
was  likewise  more  peaceful  there,  and  came  more  rapidly.  In 
Massachusetts  this  was  in  large  part  a  result  of  the  educational 
awakening  started  by  James  G.  Carter  and  Horace  Mann.  In 
New  York  it  was  due  to  the  early  support  of  Governor  De  Witt 
Clinton,  and  the  later  encouragement  and  state  aid  which  came 
from  the  Regents  of  the  University  of  the  State  of  New  York. 
Maine,  Vermont,  and  New  Hampshire  were  like  Massachusetts 
in  spirit,  and  followed  closely  its  example.  In  Rhode  Island  and 
New  Jersey,  due  to  old  conditions,  and  in  Connecticut,  due  to  the 
great  decline  in  education  there  after  1800,  the  high  school  devel- 
oped much  more  slowly,  and  it  was  not  until  after  1865  that  any 
marked  development  took  place  in  these  States.  The  democratic 
West  soon  adopted  the  idea,  and  established  high  schools  as  soon 
as  cities  developed  and  the  needs  of  the  population  warranted. 
In  the  South  the  main  high-school  development  dates  from  rela- 
tively recent  times. 

Gradually  the  high  school  has  be(;n  accepted  as  a  part  of  the 
state  common-school  system  by  all  the  American  States,  and  the 
funds  and  taxation  originally  provided  for  the  common  schopls 
have  been  extended  to  cover  the  high  school  as  well.  The  new 
States  of  the  West  have  based  their  legislation  largely  on  what 
the  Eastern  and  Central  States  earlier  fought  out. 

VII.  THE  STATE  UNIVERSITY  CROWNS  THE  SYSTEM 

The  colonial  colleges.  The  earlier  colleges  —  Harvard,  William 
and  Mary,  Yale  —  had  been  created  by  the  religious-state  govern- 
ments of  the  earlier  colonial  period,  and  continued  to  retain  some 
state  connections  for  a  time  after  the  coming  of  nationality.  As 
it  early  became  evident  that  a  democracy  demands  intelligence 
on  the  part  of  its  citizens,  that  the  leaders  of  democracy  are  not 
likely  to  be  too  highly  educated,  and  that  the  character  of  collegi- 
ate instruction  must  ultimately  influence  national  development, 
efforts  were  accordingly  made  to  change  the  old  colleges  or  create 
new  ones,  the  final  outcome  of  which  was  the  creation  of  state 


AMERICAN  BATTLE  FOR  FREE  SCHOOLS    389 

universities  in  all  the  new  and  in  most  of  the  older  States.  The 
evolution  of  the  state  university,  as  the  crowning  head  of  the  free 
public^chool  &yst_em  of  the  State,  represents  the  last  phase  which 
we  shall  trace  of  the  struggle  of  democracy  to  create  a  system  of 
schools  suited  to  its  peculiar  needs. 

The  close  of  the  colonial  period  found  the  Colonies  possessed  of 
nine  colleges.  These  were  all  small.  For  the  first  fifty  years 
of  Harvard's  history  the  attendance  at  the  college  seldom  ex- 
ceeded twenty,  and  the  President  did  all  the  teaching.  The 
first  assistant  teacher  (tutor)  was  not  appointed  until  1699,  and 
the  first  professor  not  until  1721,  when  a  professorship  of  divinity 
was  endowed.  By  1800  the  instruction  was  conducted  by  the 
President  and  three  professors  —  divinity,  mathematics,  and 
^'Oriental  languages"  —  assisted  by  a  few  tutors  who  received 
only  class  fees,  and  the  graduating  classes  seldom  exceeded  forty. 
The  course  was  four  years  in  length,  and  all  students  studied  the 
same  subjects.  The  first  three  years  were  given  largely  to  the 
so-called  ''Oriental  languages"  —  Hebrew,  Greek,  and  Latin. 
In  addition,  Freshmen  studied  arithmetic;  Sophomores,  algebra, 
geometry,  and  trigonometry;  and  Juniors,  natural  (book)  science; 
and  all  were  given  much  training  in  oratory,  and  some  general 
history  was  added.  The  Senior  year  was  given  mainly  to  ethics, 
philosophy,  and  Christian  evidences.  The  instruction  in  the 
eight  other  older  colleges,  before  1800,  was  not  materially  different. 

Growth  of  colleges  by  i860.  Fifteen  additional  colleges  were 
founded  before  1800,  and  it  has  been  estimated  that  by  that  date 
the  two  dozen  American  colleges  then  existing  did  not  have  all 
told  over  one  hundred  professors  and  instructors,  not  less  than 
one  thousand  nor  more  than  two  thousand  students,  or  property 
worth  over  one  million  dollars.  Their  graduating  classes  were 
small.  No  one  of  the  twenty-four  admitted  women  in  any  way 
to  its  privileges.  After  1820,  with  the  firmer  establishment  of  the 
Nation,  the  awakening  of  a  new  national  consciousness,  the  devel- 
opment of  larger  national  wealth,  and  a  court  decision  (p.  391) 
which  safeguarded  the  endowments,  interest  in  the  founding  of 
new  colleges  perceptibly  quickened,  as  may  be  seen  from  the 
adjoining  table,  and  between  1820  and  1880  came  the  great  period 
of  denominational  effort.  The  churches  now  made  heroic  efforts 
to  establish  colleges  generally,  and  the  denominational  college 
played  an  important  part  in  the  early  history  of  higher  education 
in  the  United  States.    Up  to  about  1870  the  provision  of  higher 


390        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

education,  as  had  been  the  case  earlier  with  the  provision  of 

secondary  education  by  the  acade- 
1780-89  .   .... ........ . .      7  rnies,  had  been  left  largely  to  private 

1790-99 7  effort.     There  were,  to  be  sure,  a 

1800-09 9  feyy^  state  universities  before   1870^ 

i82o-2g... ..............     22  though  usually  these  were  not  better 

1830-39 38  than    the    denominational    colleges 

1840-49 42  around  them,  and  often  they  main- 

1860-69! ................     73  Gained  a  non-denominational  char- 

1870-79 61  acter  only  by  preserving  a  proper 

1880-89 74  balance  between  the   different  de- 

H,     i^ -^  nominations  in  the  employment  of 

^        their  faculties.    Speaking  generally. 

Colleges  founded  up  to  1900     ,  .   ,  ,  .       .      ,     _  °  .10 

,,   ^   ^  ,,      higher  education  m  the  United  States 

(After  a  table  by  Dexter,  corrected  by         ^  •  i     , 

U.S.  Comr.Educ.  data.  Oniyapprox-  before  1870  was  provided  Very 
imate  y  correc  largely  in  the  tuitional  colleges  of 

the  different  religious  denominations,  rather  than  by  the  State. 
Of  the  246  colleges  founded  by  the  close  of  the  year  i860,  but  17 
were  state  institutions,  and  but  two  or  three  others  had  any 
state  connections. 

The  new  national  attitude.  With  the  rise  of  the  new  demo- 
cratic spirit  after  about  1820  there  came  a  demand,  felt  least  in 
New  England  and  most  in  the  South  and  the  new  States  in  the 
West,  for  institutions  of  higher  learning  which  should  represent 
the  State.  It  was  argued  that  colleges  were  important  instru- 
mentalities for  moulding  the  future,  that  the  kind  of  education 
given  in  them  must  ultimately  influence  the  welfare  of  the  State, 
and  that  higjier  education  cannot  be  regarded  as  a  private  matter. 
The  type  of  education  given  in  these  higher  institutions,  it  was 
argued,  "will  appear  on  the  bench,  at  the  bar,  in  the  pulpit,  and 
in  the  senate,  and  will  unavoidably  affect  our  civil  and  religious 
principles."  For  these  reasons,  as  well  as  to  crown  our  state 
school  system  and  to  provide  higher  educational  advantages  for 
its  leaders,  it  was  argued  that  the  State  should  exercise  control 
over  the  colleges. 

This  new  national  spirit  manifested  itself  in  a  number  of  ways. 
In  Nejv-^^xjtk  we  see  it  in  the  reorganization  of  King's  College, 
the  rechristening  of  the  institution  as  Columbia,  and  the  placing 
of  it  under  at  least  the  nominal  supervision  of  the  governing  edu- 
cational body  of  the  State.  In  Pennsylvania  an  attempt  was 
made  to  bring  the  university  into  closer  connection  with  the 


AMERICAN  BATTLE  FOR  FREE  SCHOOLS    391 

Statg,  but  this  failed.  In  New  Hampshire  the  legislature  tried, 
in  18 1 6,  to  transform  Dartmouth  College  into  a  state  institution. 
This  act  was  contested  in  the  courts,  and  the  case  was  finally 
carried  to  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States.  There  it  was 
decided,  in  18 19,  that  the  charter  of  a  college  was  a  contract,  the 
obligation  of  which  a  legislature  could  not  impair. 

Effect  of  the  Dartmouth  College  decision.     The  effect  of  this 
decision  manifested  itself  in  two  different  ways.    On  the  one  hand 
it  guaranteed  the  perpetuity  of  endowments,  and  the  great  period 
of  private  and  denominational  effort  (see  table,  p.  390)  now  fol- 
lowed.    On  the  other  hand,  since  the  States  could  not  change 
charters  and  transform  old  establishments,  they  began  to  turn 
to  the  creation  of  new  state  universities  of  their  own.     Virginia 
created  its  state  university  the  same  year  as  the  Dartmouth  case 
decision.     The  University  of  North  Carolina,  which  had  been 
established  in  1789,  and  which  began  to  give  instruction  in  1795, 
but  which  had  never  been  under  direct  state  control,  was  taken 
over  by  the  State  in  182 1.    The  University  of  Vermont,  originally 
chartered  in  1791,  was  rechartered  as  a  state  university  in  1838. 
The  University  of  Indiana  was  established  in  1820.     Alabama     ^ 
provided  for  a  state  university  in  its  first  constitution,  in  1819,      T 
and  the  institution  opened  for  instruction  in  183 1.    Michigan,  invO| 
framing  its  first  constitution  preparatory  to  entering  the  Union, 
in  1835,  made  careful  provisions  for  the  safeguarding  of  the  state       J 
university  and  for  establishing  it  as  an  integral  part  of  its  state 
school  system,  as  Indiana  had  done  in  181 6.    Wisconsin  provided 
for  the  creation  of  a  state  university  in  1836,  and  embodied  the 
idea  in  its  first  constitution  when  it  entered  the  Union  in  1848, 
and  Missouri  provided  for  a  state  university  in  1839,  Mississ'ippi 
in  1844,  Iowa  in  1847,  and  Florida  in  1856.     The  state  university    ^ 
is  to-day  found  in  every  "  new  "  State  and  in  some  of  the  "  original 
States,  and  practically  every  new  Western  and  Southern  State 
followed  the  patterns  set  by  Indiana,  Michigan,  ind  Wisconsin 
and  made  careful  provision  for  the  establishment  and  maintenance 
of  a  state  university  in  its  first  state  constitution. 

There  was  thus  iquietly  added  another  new  section  to  the 
American  educational  ladder,  and  the  free  public-school  system 
was  extended  farther  upward.  For  a  long  time  small,  poorly  sup- 
ported by  the  States,  much  like  the  church  colleges  about  them  in 
character  and  often  inferior  in  quality,  one  by  one  the  state  imiver- 
sities  have  freed  themselves  alike  from  denominational  restric- 


392        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


tions  on  the  one  hand  and  political  control  on  the  other,  and  have 
set  about  rendering  the  service  to  the  State  which  a  state  univer- 
sity ought  to  render.     Michigan,  the  first  of  our  state  universities 

to  free  itself,  take  its  proper  place, 
and  set  an  example  for  others  to 
follow,  opened  in  1841  with  two 
professors  and  six  students.  In 
1844  it  was  a  little  institution  of 
three  professors,  one  tutor,  one 
assistant,  and  one  visiting  lec- 
turer, had  but  fifty-three  stu- 
dents, and  offered  but  a  single 
course  of  study,  consisting  chiefly 
of  Greek,  Latin,  mathematics,  and 
intellectual  and  moral  science 
(R.  331).  As  late  as  1852  it  had 
but  seventy-two  students,  but  by 
i860  its  remarkable  growth  as  a 
state  university  had  begun,  it  en- 
rolled five  hundred  and  nineteen. 
The  American  free  public- 
school  system  now  established. 
By  the  close  of  the  second  quarter 
of  the  nineteenth  century,  cer- 
tainly by  i860,  we  find  the  Ameri- 
can public-school  system  fully 
established,  in  principle  at  least, 
in  all  our  Northern  States  (R.332). 
Much  yet  remained  to  be  done 
to  carry  into  full  effect  what  had 
Educational  Ladder  ^een  established  in  principle,  but 

Compare  this  with  the  figure  on  page  everywhere  democracy^  had  won 

321,  and  the  democratic  nature  of  the  its  fight,  and  the  American  pub- 
American  school  system  will  be  ap-    j-^   g^j^Q^i^  supported  by  general 

taxation,  freed  from  the  pauper- 
school  taint,  free  and  equally  open  to  all,  under  the  direction  of 
representatives  of  the  people,  free  from  sectarian  control,  and 
complete  from  the  primary  school  through  the  high  school,  and 
in  the  Western  States  through  the  university  as  well,  was  estab- 
lished permanently  in  American  public  policy.  It  was  a  real 
democratic  educational  ladder  that  had  been  created,  and  not 


1 

8 
0 

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8 
w 

I 

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s 

1  : 

s 

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,                      SENIOR 

JUNIOR                     '\\ 

SOPHOMORE                 'll 

, 

FRESHMAN                    •  1\ 

TWELFTH   GRADE               •  1| 

.             ELEVENTH   GRADE               • 

1 

.                   TENTH  GRADE                   •! 

•                     NINTH  GRADE                     • 

EIGHTH  GRADE 

1 

SEVENTH  GRADE 

. 

SIXTH   GRADE 

M 

1 

1 

FIFTH   GRADE 

2j 

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J 

FOURTH  GRADE                       'H           | 

u 

.                           THIRD  GRADE 

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SECOND  GRADE                         '  jj        ) 

1 

" 

FIRST  GRADE                             'll      [ 

•     V 

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Fig 

.  93.  The  Amer] 

CA^ 

I 

AMERICAN  BATTLE  FOR  FREE  SCHOOLS    393 

the  typical  two-class  school  system  of  continental  European 
States.  The  establishment  of  the  free  public  high  school  and 
the  state  university  represent  the  crowning  achievements  of 
those  who  struggled  to  found  a  state-supported  educational  sys- 
tem fitted  to  the  needs  of  great  democratic  States.  Probably 
no  other  influences  have  done  more  to  unify  the  American  peo- 
ple, reconcile  diverse  points  of  view,  eliminate  state  jealousies, 
set  ideals  for  the  people,  and  train  leaders  for  the  service  of  the 
States  and  of  the  Nation  than  the  academies,  high  schools,  and 
colleges  scattered  over  the  land.  They  have  educated  but  a 
small  percentage  of  the  people,  to  be  sure,  but  they  have  trained 
most  of  the  leaders  who  have  guided  the  American  dejnocracy 
since  its  birth. 


QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

1.  Explain  the  theory  of  "vested  rights  "  as  applied  to  private  and  parochial 
schools. 

2.  Does  every  great  advance  in  provisions  for  human  weKare  require  a 
period  of  education  and  propaganda?    Illustrate. 

3.  Explain  just  what  is  meant  by  "the  wealth  of  the  State  must  educate 
the  children  of  the  State." 

4.  Show  how  the  retention  of  the  pauper-school  idea  would  have  been 
dangerous  to  the  life  of  the  Republic. 

5.  Why  were  the  cities  more  anxious  to  escape  from  the  operation  of  the 
pauper-school  law  than  were  the  towns  and  rural  districts? 

6.  Why  were  the  pauper-school  and  the  rate-bill  so  hard  to  eliminate? 

7.  Explain  why,  in  America,  schools  naturally  developed  from  the  com- 
munity outward. 

8.  Show  the  gradual  transition  from  church  control  of  education,  through 
state  aid  of  church  schools,  to  secularized  state  schools. 

9.  Show  why  secularized  state  schools  were  the  only  possible  solution  for 
the  United  States. 

10.  Show  that  secularization  would  naturally  take  place  in  the  textbooks 
and  the  instruction,  before  manifesting  itself  in  the  laws. 

11.  Show  how  the  American  academy  was  a  natural  development  in  the 
national  hfe. 

12.  Show  how  the  American  high  school  was  a  natural  development  after 
the  academy. 

13.  Show  why  the  high  school  could  be  opposed  by  men  who  had  accepted 
tax-supported  elementary  schools.  Why  has  such  reasoning  been  aban- 
doned now? 

14.  Explain  the  difference,  and  illustrate  from  the  history  of  American  edu- 
cational development,  between  establishing  a  thing  in  principle  and  carr>'- 
ing  it  into  full  effect. 

15.  Show  why  it  was  natural  that  higher  education  should  have  been  left 
largely  to  denominational  effort,  before  i860. 

16.  Was  the  early  argument  as  to  the  influence  of  higher  education  on  the 
State  a  true  argument?     Why? 

17.  What  would  have  been  the  probable  results  had  the  Dartmouth  College 
case  been  decided  the  other  way? 


394        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

1 8.  Explain  why  it  required  so  long  to  get  the  state  universities  started  od 
their  real  development. 

19.  Show  how  the  opening  of  collegiate  instruction  to  women  was  a  phase 
of  the  new  democratic  movement. 

20.  Show  how  college  education  has  been  a  unifying  force  in  the  national  life. 

SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  oj  Readings  the  following  illustrative  selections, 
are  reproduced: 

316.  Mann:  The  Ground  of  the  Free-School  System. 

317.  Governor  Cleveland:  Repeal  of  the  Connecticut  School  Law. 

318.  Mann:  On  the  Repeal  of  the  Connecticut  School  Law. 

319.  Gulliver:  The  Struggle  for  Free  Schools  in  Norwich. 

320.  Address:  The  State  and  Education. 

321.  Michigan:  A  Rate-Bill,  and  a  Warrant  for  Collection. 

322.  Mann:  On  Religious  Instruction  in  the  Schools. 

323.  Michigan:  Petition  for  a  Division  of  the  School  Fund. 

324.  Michigan:  Counter-Petition  against  a  Division, 

325.  Connecticut:  Act  of  Incorporation  of  Norwich  Free  Academy. 

326.  Boston:  Establishment  of  the  First  American  High  School. 

327.  Boston:  The  Secondary-School  System  in  1823. 

328.  Massachusetts:  The  High  School  Law  of  1827. 

329.  Gulliver:  An  Example  of  the  Opposition  to  High  Schools. 

330.  Michigan:  The  Kalamazoo  Decision. 

331.  Michigan:  Program  of  Studies  at  University,  1843. 

332.  Tappan:  The  Michigan  State  System  of  PubUc  Instruction. 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

*Brown,  E.  E.     The  Making  of  our  Middle  Schools. 
*Brown,  S.  W.     The  Secularization  of  American  Education. 
Cubberley,  E.  P.     Public  Education  in  the  United  States: 
Dexter,  E.  G.    A  History  of  Education  in  the  United  States. 
*Hinsdale,  B.  A.     Horace  Mann,  and  the  Common  School  Revival  in  the 

United  States. 
*Inglis,  A.  J.     The  Rise  of  the  High  School  in  Massachusetts. 
Martin,  George  H.     The  Evolution  of  the  Massachusetts  Public  School 

System. 
*Mead,  A.  R.     The  Development  of  Free  Schools  in  the  United  States,  as 
Illustrated  by  Connecticut  and  Michigan. 
Taylor,  James  M.     Before  Vassar  Opened. 
*Thwing,  Charles  F.    A  History  of  Higher  Education  in  America. 


CHAPTER  XXVII 

EDUCATION  BECOMES  A  NATIONAL  TOOL 

I.  SPREAD  OF  THE  STATE-CONTROL  IDEA 

The  four  type  nations.  We  have  now  traced,  in  some  detail, 
the  struggles  of  forward-looking  men  to  establish  national  sys- 
tems of  education  in  four  great  world  nations.  In  each  we  have 
described  the  steps  by  means  of  which  the  State  gradually  super- 
seded the  Church  in  the  control  of  education,  and  the  motives 
a,nd  impulses  which  finally  led  the  State  to  take  over  the  school  as 
a  function  of  the  State.  The  steps  and  impelling  motives  and 
rate  of  transfer  were  not  the  same  in  any  two  nations,  but  in  each 
of  the  five  the  political  necessities  of  the  State  in  time  made  the 
transfer  seem  desirable.  Xime  everywhere  was  reguired  to  effect 
the  change.  The  movement  began  earHest  and  was  concluded 
earliest  in  the  German  States,  and  was  concluded  last  in  England. 
In  the  German  States  and  France  the  change  came  rapidly  and 
as  a  result  of  legislative  acts  or  imperial  decrees.  In  England  and 
the  United  States  the  transfer  took  place,  as  we  have  seen,  only 
in  response  to  the  slow  development  of  public  opinion. 

This  change  in  control  and  extension  of  educational  advantages 
was  essentially  a  nineteenth-century  movement,  and  a  resultant 
of  the  new  political  philosophy  and  the  democratic  revolutions  of 
the  later  eighteenth  century,  combined  with  the  induatrial  revo- 
lution of  the  nineteenth  century.  A  new  political  impulse  now 
replaced  the  earlier  religious  motive  as  the  incentive  for  education, 
and  education  for  literacy  and  citizenship  became,  during  the 
nineteenth  century,  a  new  political  ideal  that  has,  in  time,  spread 
to  progressive  nations  all  over  the_HQrld. 

The  four  great  nations  whose  educational  evolution  has  been 
described  in  the  preceding  chapters  may  be  regarded  as  having 
formed  types  which  have  since  been  copied,  in  more  or  less  detail, 
by  the  more  progressive  nations  in  different  parts  of  the  world. 
The  contingntaLEuropean  t^Q-class  school  system,  the  American 
educational  ladder,  and  the  English  tendency  to  combine  the  two 
and  use  the  best  parts  of  each,  have  been  reproduced  in  the  differ- 
ent national  educational  systems  which  have  been  created  by  the 
vanoug  poHtlcal  governments  of  the  world.     The  continental 


396        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

European  idea  of  a  centralized  ministry  for  education,  with  an 
apppinted-iiead  or  a  cabinet  minister  in  control,  has  also  been 
widely  copied.  The  Prussian  two-class  plan  has  been  most  influ- 
ential among  the  Teutonic  and  Slavic  peoples  of  Europe,  and  has 
also  deeply  influenced  educational  development  among  the  Jap- 
aiiese;  English  ideas  have  been  extensively  copied  in  the  English 
self-governing  dominions;  and  the  American  plan  has  been  clearly 
influential  in  Canada,  the  Argentine,  and  in  China.  The  French 
centralized_plan  for  organization  and  administration  has  been 
widely  copied  in  the  state  educational  organizations  of  the  Latin 
nations  of  Europe  and  South  America.  In  a  general  way  it  may 
be  stated  that  the  more  democratic  the  government  of  a  nation 
has  become  the  greater  has  been  the  tendency  to  break  away 
from  the  two-class  schooLsystem,  to  introduce  more  of  an  educa- 
tional ladder,  and  to  bring  in  more  of  the  English  con£epjtion  of 
granting  to  localities  a  reasonable  amount  of  local  liberty  in  edu- 
cational affairs. 

Spread  of  the  state-control  idea  among  northern  nations.  The 
development  of  schools  under  the  control  of  the  government,  and 
the  extension  of  state  supervision  to  the  existing  religious  schools,, 
took  place  in  the  different  cantons  of  Switzerland,  and  in  Holland,. 
Denmark,  Norway,  and  Sweden,  somewhat  contemporaneously 
with  the  development  described  for  the  four  type  nations.  The 
work  of  Pestalozzi  and  Fellenberg,  and  of  their  disciples  and  fol-r 
lowers,  had  given  an  early  impetus  to  the  establishment  of  schoojs 
and  teacher- training  in  the  Swiss  cantons,  most  being  done  in  the. 
Gennan-speaking  portions. 

Finland  should  also  be  classed  with  these  northern  nations  in 
matters  of  educational  development.  Lutheran  ideas  as  to  reli- 
gion  and  the  need  for  education  took  deep  hold  there  at  an  early 
date  (p.  158).  A  knowledge  of  reading  and  the  Catechism^  was 
made  necessary  for  confirmation  as  early  as  1686,  and  dgmocratic 
ideas  also  found  an  ejrly  ljorne_ among  this  people.  In  conse- 
quence the  Finns  have  for  long  been  a  literate  people.  The  law 
making  elementary  education  a  function  of  the  State,  however, 
dates  only  from  1866,  and  secondary  education  was  taken  over 
from  the  ecclesiastical  authorities  only  in  187?.. 

Similarly,  S_CQtland,  another  northern  nation,  began  schools  as 
a  phase  of  its  Reformation  fervor.  During  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury the  parish  schools,  created  by  the  Acts  of  1646  (R.  179; 
p.  178)  and  1696,  proved  insufficient,  and  vojuntary^hools  were 


EDUCATION  BECOMES  A  NATIONAL  TOOL    397 

added  to  supplement  them.  Together  these  insured  for  Scotland 
a  much  higher  degree  of  literacy  than  was  the  case  in  England. 
The  final  state  organization  of  education  in  Scotland  dates  from 
the  Scottish  Education  Act  of  1872. 

The  map  reproduced  here,  showing  the  progress  of  general 
education  by  the  close  of  the  nineteenth  century,  as  measured  by 


I  [Less  than!  < 

dUitoG*  /  ^    A^SSa 

, I  ,        /  rvflu.  ^  J^^^^^s  ^ 

;;;;;;;;:;;;:  12  to  16%  „  >-'    '^^  -^  /^:s^^r 

l20to30  9fc         K        _«    /y    fe'ffi 

KSl60to759fc  1  ^/    ^ 

I  ft    y    fPINLAND^ 

fOver  85%       /     c*  C,o    I 

-    GERMANY  _^ _^ 


Fig.  94.  The  Progress  of  Literacy  in  Europe  by  the  Close  or  the 
Nineteenth  Century 


the  spread  of  the  ability  to  read  and  write,  reveals  at  a  glance  the 
high  degree  of  literacy  of  the  northern  Teutonic  and  mixed  Teu- 
tonic nations.  It  was  among  these  nations  that  the  Protestant 
Reiormation  ideas  made  the  deepest  impression;  it  was  in  these 
northern  States  that  the  Protestant  elementary  vernacular  school, 
to  teach  reading  and  religion,  attained  its  earliest  start;  it  was 
there  that  the  school  was  taken  over  from  the  Church  and  erected 
into  an  effectivjg  .national  instrument  at  an  early  date;  and  it  was 
.these  nations  which  had  been  most  successful,  by  the  close  of  the 
nineteenth  century,  in  extending  the  elements  of  education  to  all 
and  thus  producing  literate  populations. 


398        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

The  state-control  idea  in  the  south  and  east  of  Europe.  As  we 
pass  to  the  south  and  east  of  Europe  we  pass  not  only  to  lands 
which  remained  loyal  to  the  Koman  Church,  or  are  adherents  of 
the  Greek  Church,  and  hence  did  not  experience  the  Reformation 
fervor  with  its  accompanying  zeal  for  education,  but  also  to  lands 
untouched  by  the  French-Revolution  movement  and  where 
democratic  ideas  have  only  recently  begun  to  make  any  progress. 
Gxe£ce  alone  forms  an  exception  to  this  statement,  a  constitu- 
tional government  having  been  established  there  in  1843.  Re- 
moved from  the  main^  stream  of  European  civilization,  these 
nations  have  been  influenced  less  by  modern  forces;  the  hold  of 
the  Church  on  the  education  of  the  young  has  there  been  longest 
retained;  and  the  taking-over  of  education  by  the  State  has  there 
been  longest  deferred.  In  consequence,  the  schools  provided 
have  for  long  been  inadequate  both  in  number  and  scope,  and  the 
progress  of  literacy  and  democratic  ideas  among  the  people  has 
been  slow. 

The  state-control  idea  in  the  English  self-governing  dominions. 
The  English  and  French  settlers  in  Ontario,  Quebec,  and  the 
Maritime  Provinces  of  Canada  brought  the  English  and  French 
parochial-school  ideas  from  their  home-lands  with  them,  but 
these  home  conceptions  were  materially  modified,  at  an  early 
date,  by  settlers  from  the  northern  States  of  the  American  Union. 
These  introduced  the  New  England  idea  of  state  control  and 
public  responsibility  for  education.  In  part  copying  precedents 
recently  established  in  the  new  American  States,  as  an  outcome 
of  the  struggles  there  to  establish  free,  tax-supported,  and  state- 
controlled  schools,  both  Ontario  and  Quebec  early  began  the 
establishment  of  state  systems  of  ejjucation  for  their  people.  A 
superintendent  of  education  was  appointed  in  Ontario  in  1844, 
and  the  Common  School  Act  of  1846  laid  the  foundation  of  the 
state  school  system  of  the  Province.  In  the  law  of  187 1. a  system 
of  uniform,  fr^^^  cornpulsory,  and  state-inspected  schools  was 
definitely  provided  for.  Quebec,  in  1845,  made  the  ecclesiastical 
parish  the  unit  for  school  administration;  in  1852  appointed 
government  inspectors  for  the  church  schools;  and  in  1859  pro- 
vided for  a  Council  of  Public  Instruction  to  control  all  schools  in 
the  Province.  The  Dominion  Act  of  1867  left  education,  as  in 
the  United  States,  to  the  several  Provinces  to  control,  and  state» 
systems  of  education,  though  with  large  liberty  in  religious  in- 
struction, or  the  incorporation  of  the  relijpous  schools  into  the 


EDUCATION  BECOMES  A  NATIONAL  TOOL    399 

state  school  systems,  have  since  been  erected  in  all  the  Canadian 
Preiyinces.  Following  American  precedents,  too,  a  thoroughly 
democratic  educational  ladder  has  almost  everywhere  been  cre- 
ated, substantially  like  that  shown  in  the  Figure  on  page  392, 

In  Australia  and  New  Zealand  education  has  similarly  been 
left  to  the  different  States  to  handle,  but  a  state  centralized  con- 
trol has  been  provided  there  which  is  more  akin  to  French  practice 
than  to  English  ideas.  In  each  State,  primary  education  has  been 
made  free,  compulsory,  secular,  and  state-supported.  The  laws 
making  such  provision  in  the  different  States  date  from  1872,  in 
Victoria;  1875,  ^^  Queensland;  1878,  in  South  Australia,  West 
Australia,  and  New  Zealand;  and  1880,  in  New  South  Wales. 
Secondary  education  has  not  as  yet  been  made  free,  and  many 
excellent  privately  endowed  or  fee-supported  secondary  schools, 
after  the  EngUsh  plan,  are  foimd  in  the  different  States. 

In  the  new  Union  of  South  Africa  all  university  education  has 
been  taken  over  by  the  Union,  while  the  existing  school  systems 
of  the  difierent  Sjtates  are  rapidly  being  taken  over  and  expanded 
by  the  state  governments,  and  transformed  into  constructive 
instruments  of  the  States. 

The  state-control  idea  in  the  South  American  States.  As  we 
have  seen  in  chapter  xx,  the  spirit  of  nationality  awakened  by 
the  French  Revolution  soon  spread  to  South  America,  and  be- 
tween 18 1 5  and  182 1  all  of  Spain's  South  American  colonies  re- 
volted, declared  their  independence  from  the  mother  country, 
and  set  up  constitutional  republics.  Brazil,  in  1822,  in  a  similar 
manner  severed  its  connections  from  Portugal.  The  United 
States,  through  the  Monroe  Doctrine  (1826),  helped  these  new 
States  to  maintain  their  independence.  For  approximately  half 
a  century  these  States,  isolated  as  they  were  and  engaged  in  a 
long  and  difficult  struggle  to  evolve  stable  forms  of  govern- 
ment, left  such  education  as  was  provided  to  private  individ- 
uals and  societies  and  to  the  missionaries  and  teaching  orders 
of  the  Roman  Church.  After  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury, the  new  forces  stirring  in  the  modem  world  began  to  be 
felt  in  South  America  as  well,  and,  after  about  1870,  a  well- 
defined  movement  to  establish  state  school  systems  began  to  be 
in  evidence. 

The  Argentine  constitution  of  1853  had  directed  the  establish- 
ment of  primary  schools  by  the  State,  but  nothing  of  importance 
was  done  until  after  the  election  of  Dr.  Sarmiento  as  President,  in 


400        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

1868.  Under  his  influence  an  American-type  normal  school  was 
established,  teachers  were  imported  from  the  United  States,  and 
liberal  appropriations  for  education  were  begun.  In  1873  ^ 
general  system  of  national  aid  for  primary  education  was  estab- 
lished, and  in  1884  a  new  law  laid  the  basis  of  the  piesent  state 
school  sygtem. 

In  Chili,  the  constitution  of  1833  declared  education  to  be  of 
supreme  importance,  and  a  normal  school  was  established  in  San- 
tiago, as  early  as  1840.  The  basic  law  for  the  organization  of 'a 
state  system  of  primary  instruction,  however,  dates  from  1860^ 
and  the  law  organizing  a  state  system  of  secondary  and  higher 
education  from  1^872, 

In  Peru,  an  educational  reform  roovement  was  inaugurate  in 
i_S76,  but  the  war  with  Chili  (1879-84)  checked  all  progress.  In 
1896  an  Educational  Commission  was  appointed  to  visit  the 
United  States  and  Europe,  and  the  law  of  1901  marked  the  crea- 
tion^ of  a  ministry  for  education  and  the  real  beginnings  of  a  state 
school  system. 

The  Brazilian  constitution  of  1824  left  education  to  the  several 
States  (twenty  and  one  Federal  District),  and  a  permissive  law 
of  1827  allowed  the  different  States  to  establish  schools.  It  was 
not  until  1854,  however,  that  public  schools  were  organized  in 
the  Federal  District,  and  these  mark  the  real  beginning  of  state 
education  in  Brazil.  Since  then  the  establishment  of  state  schools 
has  gradually  extended  to  the  coast  States,  and  inland  with  the 
building  of  railway  lines  and  the  opening-up  of  the  interior  to 
outside  influences.  The  basis  for  state-controlled  education  has 
now  been  laid  in  all  the  States,  but  the  attendance  at  the  schools 
as  yet  is  small. 

In  some  of  the  other  South  American  States,  such  as  Bolivia, 
Ecuador,  and  Venezuela,  but  little  progress  in  extending  state- 
controlled  schools  has  as  yet  been  made,  and  the  training  of  the 
young  is  still  left  largely  to  private  effort,  the  Church,  and  the 
religious  orders.  The  state-control  idea,  though,  has  been  defi- 
nitely established  in  principle  in  these  countries. 

The  state-school  idea  in  eastern  Asia.  In  1854  Admiral  Perry 
effected  the  treaty  of  friendship  with  Japan  which  virtually  opened 
that  nation  to  the  influences  of  western  civihzation,  and  one  of  the 
most  wonderful  transformations  of  a  people  recorded  in  history 
soon  began.  In  1867  a  new  Mikado  came  to  the  throne,  and  in 
1868  the  small  military  class,  which  had  ruled  the  nation  for  some 


EDUCATION  BECOMES  A  NATIONAL  TOOL 


401 


seven  hundred  years,  gave  up  their  power  to  the  new  ruler,  A 
new  era  in  Japan,  known  as  the  Meiji,  dates  from  this  event. 
In  187 1  the  centuries- old  feudal  system  was  aboUshed,  and  all 
classes  in  the  State  were  declared  equal  before  the  law.  This 
same  year  the  first  newspaper  in  Japan  was  begun.  In  1872  the 
first  educational  code  for  the  nation  was  promulgated  by  the 
Mikado.  This  ordered  the  general  estabhshment  of  schools, 
the  compulsory  education  of  the  people  (R.  334  a),  and  the 
equality  of  all  classes  in  educational  matters.  Students  were 
now  sent  abroad,  especially  to  Germany  and  the  United  States; 
foreign  teachers  were  imported;  an  American  normal-school 
teacher  was  placed  in  charge  of  the  newly  opened  state  normal 
school;  the  American  class  method  of  instruction  was  introduced; 
schoolbooks  and  teaching  appa- 
ratus were  prepared,  after  Ameri- 
can models;  middle  schools  were 
organized  in  the  towns;  higher 
schools  were  opened  in  the  cities; 
and  the  old  Academy  of  Foreign 
Languages  was  evolved  (1877)  into 
theXTniversity  of  Tokyo.  In  1884 
the  study  of  English  was  intro- 
duced into  the  courses  of  the  public 
schools.  In  1889  a  form  of  consti- 
tution was  granted  to  the  people, 
and  a  parliament_established. 

Adapting  the  continental  Euro- 
pean idea  of  a  two-class  school 
system  to  the  peculiar  needs  of 
the  n^on,  the  Japanese  have 
worked  out,  during  the  past  half- 
century-,  a  type  of  state-controlled 
school  system  which  has  been  well 
a3apted  to  their  national  needs. 
Instruction  in  national  morality, 
based  on  the  ancestral  VlffUes, 
brotherly  affection,  and  loyalty  to 
the  constitution  and  the  ruling 
class  (R.  334  b-c),  has  been  well  worked  out  in  their  schools. 
Though  the  government  has  remained  largely  autocratic  in 
form,  the  Japanese  have,  however,  retained  throughout  all  their 


Fig.  95.  The  Japanese  Two- 
Class  School  System 


402        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


educational  development  the  fundamental  democratic  principle 
enunciated  in  the  Preamble  to  the  Educational  Code  of  i872_ 
(R.  334  a),  viz.,  that  every  one  without  distinction  of  class  or 
sex  shall  receive  primary  education  at  least,  and  that  the  oppor- 
tunity for  higher  education  shall  be  open  to  all  children.  So  com- 
pletely has  the  education  of  the  people  been  conceived  of  as  one 
of  the  most  important  functions  of  the  State  that  all  education 

has  been  placed  under  a  central- 
ized state  control,  with  a  Cabinet 
MixLister  in  charge  of  all  admin- 
istrative matters  connected  with 
the  education  of  the  nation. 

Since  near  the  end  of  the  nine- 
teenth century  what  promises  to 
be  an  even  more  wonderful  trans- 
formation of  a  people — political, 
social,  scientific,  and  industrial 
— has  been  taking  place  in  China 
(R-  335)-  A  much  more  demo- 
cratic type  of  national  school  sys- 
tem than  that  of  the  Japanese  has 
been  worked  out,  and  this  the 
new  (191 2)  Republic  of  China  is 
rapidly  extending  in  the  prov- 
inces, and  making  education  a 
very  important  function  of  the 
new  democratic  national  life.  In 
the  beginning,  when  displacing 
the  centuries-old  Confucian  ed- 
ucational system,  the  Chinese 
adopted  Japanese  ideas  and  organized  their  schools  (1905)  some- 
what after  the  Japanese  model.  Later  on,  responding  to  the 
influence  of  many  American-educated  Chinese  and  to  the  more 
democratic  impulses  of  the  Chinese  people,  the  new  government 
established  by  the  Republic  of  191 2  changed  the  school  system  at 
first  established  so  as  to  make  it  in  type  more  like  the  American 
educational  ladder.  The  new  Chinese  school  system  is  shown  in 
the  drawing  on  this  page.  The  university  instruction  is  modern 
and  excellent,  and  the  addition  of  the  cultural  and  scientific  knowl- 
edge worked  out  in  western  Europe  to  the  intellectual  qualities 
of  this  capable  people  can  hardly  fail  to  result,  in  time,  in  the 


23 


21 


20 

19 


18 


16 


15 


gi)10 


t'lG.  96.  The  Chinese 
Educational  Ladder 


EDUCATION  BECOMES  A  NATIONAL  TOOL    403 

production  of  a  wonderful  modern  nation,  probably  in  one  of  the 
greatest  nations  of  the  mid-twentieth  century. 

In  1 89 1  the  independent  Kingdom  of  Siam,  awakened  from  its 
age-long  isolation  by  new  world  influences,  sent  a  prince  to  Europe 
to  study  and  report  on  the  state  systems  of  education  maintained 
there.  As  a  result  of  his  report  a  department  of  public  education 
was  created,  which  later  evolved  into  a  ministry  of  public  instruc- 
tion, and  elementary  schools  were  opened  by  the  State  in  the  thir- 
teen thousand  old  Buddhist  temples.  Since  this  beginning,  higher 
schools  of  law,  medicine,  agriculture,  engineering,  and  military 
science  have  been  added,  taught  largely  by  imported  English  and 
American  teachers.  In  consequence  of  the  new  educational  or- 
ganization, and  the  new  influences  brought  in,  the  whole  life  of 
this  little  kingdom  has  been  transformed  during  the  past  three 
decades. 

General  acceptance  of  the  state-function  conception.  The 
different  national  school  systems,  the  creation  of  which  has  so  far 
been  briefly  described,  are  typical  and  represent  a  great  world 
movement  which  characterized  the  latter  half  of  the  nineteenth 
century.  This  movement  is  still  under  way,  and  increasing  in 
strength.  Other  state  school  organizations  might  be  added  to  the 
hst,  but  those  so  far  given  are  sufficient.  Beginning  with  the  na- 
tions which  were  earliest  to  the  front  of  the  onward  march  of  civi- 
lization, the  movement  for  the  state  control  of  education,  itself  an 
expression  of  new  world  forces  and  new  national  needs,  has  in  a 
century  spread  to  every  continent  on  the  globe.  To-day  pro- 
gressive nations  everywhere  conceive  of  education  for  their  peo- 
ple as  so  closely  associated  with  their  social,  political,  and  indus- 
trial progress,  and  their  national  welfare  and  prosperity  (R.  336), 
that  the  control  of  education  has  come  to  be  regarded  as  an  indis- 
pensable function  of  the  State.  State  constitutions  (R.  333)  have 
accordingly  required  the  creation  of  comprehensive  state  school 
systems;  legislators  have  turned  to  education  with  a  new  interest; 
bulky  state  school  codes  have  given  force  to  constitutional  man- 
dates; national  literacy  has  become  a  goal;  the  diffusion  of  politi- 
cal intelligence  by  means  of  the  school  has  naturally  followed  the 
extension  of  the  suffrage ;  while  the  many  new  forces  and  impulses 
of  a  modern  world  have  served  to  make  the  old  religious  type  of 
education  utterly  inadequate,  and  to  call  for  national  action  to  a 
degree  never  conceived  of  in  the  days  when  rehgious,  private,  and 
voluntary  educational  effort  sufficed  to  meet  the  needs  of  the  few 


404        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

who  felt  the  call  to  learn.  What  a  few  of  the  more  important  of 
these  new  nineteenth-century  forces  have  been,  which  have  so 
fundamentally  modified  the  character  and  direction  of  education, 
it  may  be  worth  while  to  set  forth  briefly,  before  proceeding 
further.    ^  ^ 

II.  NEW  MODIFYING  FORCES 

The  advance  of  scientific  knowledge.  The  first  and  most  im- 
portant of  these  nineteenth-century  forces,  and  the  one  which 
preceded  and  conditioned  all  the  others,  was  the  great  increase  of 
accurate  knowledge  as  to  the  forces  and  laws  of  the  physical  world, 
arising  from  the  application  of  scientific  method  to  the  investiga- 
tion of  the  phenomena  of  the  material  world  (R.  337).  During 
the  nineteenth  century  the  intellect  of  man  was  stimulated  to  ac- 
tivity as  it  had  not  been  before  since  the  days  when  little  Athens 
was  the  intellectual  center  of  the  world.  What  the  Revival  of 
Learning  was  to  the  classical  scholars  of  the  fifteenth  and  six- 
teenth centuries,  the  movement  for  scientific  knowledge  and  its 
application  to  human  affairs  was  to  the  nineteenth.  It  changed 
the  outlook  of  man  on  the  problems  of  life,  vastly  enlarged  the 
intellectual  horizon,  and  gave  a  new  trend  to  education  and  to 
scholarly  effort.  What  the  scholars  of  the  seventeenth  and  eight- 
eenth centuries  had  been  slowly  gathering  together  as  interesting 
and  classified  phenomena,  the  scientific  scholars  of  the  nineteenth 
century  organized,  interpreted,  expanded,  and  applied. 

In  the  domain  of  the  physical  sciences  very  important  advances 
characterized  the  century.  Chemistry,  up  to  the  end  of  the  first 
quarter  of  the  nineteenth  century  largely  a  collection  of  unrelated 
facts,  was  transformed  by  the  labors  of  such  men  as  Dalton 
(1766-1844),  Faraday  (1791-1867),  and  Liebig  into  a  wonder- 
fully well-organized  and  vastly  important  science.  Physics  has 
experienced  an  equally  important  development.  It,  too,  at  the 
beginning  of  the  nineteenth  century  was  in  the  preHminary  state 
of  collecting,  coordinating,  and  trying  to  interpret  data.  In  a 
century  physics  has,  by  experimentation  and  the  application  of 
mathematics  to  its  problems,  been  organized  into  a  number  of 
exceedingly  important  sciences.  What  at  the  beginning  of  the 
nineteenth  century  was  a  small  textbook  study  of  natural  philos- 
ophy has  since  been  subdivided  into  the  two  great  sciences  of 
physics  and  chemistry,  and  these  in  turn  into  numerous  well- 
organized  branches. 


EDUCATION  BECOMES  A  NATIONAL  TOOL    405 

In  1830  Charles  Lyell  applied  law  to  the  history  of  the  earth  in 
his  Principles  of  Geology,  and  in  1859  Charles  Darwin  published 
the  results  of  thirty  years  of  careful  biological  research  in  his 
Origin  of  Species.  The  former  overthrew  the  earlier  theory  of 
earthly  "catastrophes,"  while  the  latter  swept  away  the  old 
theory  of  special  and  individual  creation  which  had  been  cher- 
ished since  early  antiquity,  and  substituted  in  its  place  the  reign 
of  law  in  the  field  of  biological  life.  These  substituted  the  prin- 
ciple of  orderly  evolution  for  the  old  theory  of  special  creation, 
marked  forward  steps  in  human  thinking,  and  gave  an  entirely 
new  direction  to  the  study  of  world  development  and  natural 
history. 

In  1856  the  German  Virchow  (1821-1902)  made  his  far-reach- 
ing contribution  of  cellular  pathology  to  medical  science ;  between 
1859  and  1865  the  French  scientist  Pasteur  (1822-95)  established 
the  germ  theory  of  fermentation,  putrefaction,  and  disease;  about 
the  same  time  the  English  surgeon  Lister  (1827-1914)  began  to 
use  antiseptics  in  surgery;  and,  in  1879,  the  bacillus  of  typhoid 
fever  was  found.  Out  of  this  work  the  modem  sciences  of  pa- 
thology, aseptic  surgery,  bacteriology,  and  immunity  were  created, 
and  the  cause  and  mode  of  transmission  of  the  great  diseases 
which  once  decimated  armies  and  cities  —  plague,  cholera, 
malaria,  typhoid,  typhus,  yellow  fever,  dysentery  —  as  well  as 
the  scourges  of  tuberculosis,  diphtheria,  and  lockjaw,  have  been 
determined.  The  importance  of  these  discoveries  for  the  future 
welfare  and  happiness  of  mankind  can  scarcely  be  overestimated. 
Sanitary  science  arose  as  an  application  of  these  discoveries,  and 
since  about  1875  ^  sanitary  and  hygienic  revolution  has  taken 
place. 

The  above  represent  but  a  few  of  the  more  important  of  the 
many  great  scientific  advances  of  the  nineteenth  century.  What 
the  thinkers  of  the  eighteenth  century  had  sowed  broadcast 
through  a  general  interest  in  science,  their  successors  in  the  nine- 
teenth reaped  as  an  abundant  harvest.  The  fruitfulness  of  the 
Baconian  method  (p.  210)  in  the  hands  of  his  successors  far  sur- 
passed his  most  sanguine  expectations. 

The  applications  of  science  and  the  result.  All  this  work,  as 
has  been  frequently  pointed  out  (R.  338),  had  of  necessity  to  pre- 
cede the  applications  of  science  to  the  arts  and  to  the  advance- 
ment of  the  comforts  and  happiness  of  mankind.  The  new  stud- 
ies soon  caught  the  attention  of  younger  scholars;  special  schools 


406        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

for  their  study  began  to  be  established  by  the  middle  of  the  nine- 
teenth century;  enthusiastic  students  of  science  began  forcefully 
to  challenge  the  centuries-long  supremacy  of  classical  studies; 
funds  for  scientific  research  began  to  be  provided;  the  printing- 
press  disseminated  the  new  ideas;  and  thousands  of  applications 
of  science  to  trade  and  industry  and  human  welfare  began  to  at- 
tract public  attention  and  create  a  new  demand  for  schools  and 
for  a  new  extension  of  learning.  During  the  past  century  the  ap- 
plications of  this  new  learning  to  matters  that  intimately  touch 
the  life  of  man  have  been  so  numerous  and  so  far-reaching  in  their' 
effects  that  they  have  produced  a  revolution  in  life  conditions  un- 
like anything  the  world  ever  experienced  before.  In  all  the 
days  from  the  time  of  the  Crusades  to  the  end  of  the  Napoleonic 
Wars  the  changes  in  living  effected  were  less,  both  in  scope  and 
importance,  than  have  taken  place  in  the  century  since  Napoleon 
was  sent  to  Saint  Helena. 

This  transformation  we  call  the  Industrial  Revolution.  Since 
the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century,  with  the  very  rapid 
development  of  factories,  the  building  of  railroads,  and  the  ex- 
tension of  steamship  lines,  even  the  most  remote  countries  have 
been  affected  by  the  new  forces.  Nations  long  primitive  and 
secluded  have  been  modernized  and  industrialized;  century-old 
trades  and  skills  have  been  destroyed  by  machinery ;  the  old  home 
and  village  industries  have  been  replaced  by  the  factory  system; 
cities  for  manufacturing  and  trade  have  everywhere  experienced  a 
rapid  development;  and  even  on  the  farm  the  agricultural  meth- 
ods of  bygone  days  have  been  replaced  by  the  discoveries  of 
science  and  the  products  of  invention.  Almost  nothing  is  done 
to-day  as  it  was  a  century  ago,  and  only  in  remote  places  do  peo- 
ple live  as  they  used  to  live. 

Living  conditions  a  century  ago.  A  century  ago  people  every- 
where lived  comparatively  simple  lives.  The  steam  engine, 
while  beginning  to  be  put  to  use  (p.  266),  had  not  as  yet  been  ex- 
tensively applied  and  made  the  willing  and  obedient  slave  of  man. 
The  lightning  had  not  as  yet  been  harnessed,  and  the  now  om- 
nipresent electric  motor  was  then  still  unknown.  Only  in  Eng- 
land had  manufacturing  reached  any  large  proportions,  and  even 
there  the  methods  were  somewhat  primitive.  Thousands  of 
processes  which  we  now  perform  simply  and  effectively  by  the 
use  of  steam  or  electric  power,  a  century  ago  were  done  slowly 
and  painfully  by  human  labor.    The  chief  sources  of  power  were 


EDUCATION  BECOMES  A  NATIONAL  TOOL    407 


Fig.  97.  Man  Power  before  the 
Days  of  Steam 

Foot  power  a  century  ago.  (From  a  cut 
by  Anderson,  America's  first  important 
engraver) 


then  man  and  horse  power.  The  home  was  a  center  in  which 
most  of  the  arts  and  trades  were  practiced,  and  in  the  long 
winter  evenings  the  old  crafts 
and  skills  were  turned  to  com- 
mercial account.  What  every 
family  used  and  wore  was 
largely  made  in  the  home,  the 
village,  or  the  neighborhood. 

Change  in  living  conditions 
to-day.  In  a  century  all  has 
been  changed.  Steam  and 
electricity  and  sanitary  sci- 
ence have  transformed  the 
world;  the  railway,  steamship, 
telegraph,  cable,  and  printing- 
press  have  made  the  world 
one.  The  output  of  the  fac- 
tory system  has  transformed  hving  and  labor  conditions,  even 
to  the  remote  comers  of  the  world;  sanitary  science  and  sanitary 
legislation  have  changed  the  primitive  conditions  of  the  home 
and  made  of  it  a  clean  and  comfortable  modem  abode;  men 
and  women  have  been  freed  from  an  almost  incalculable  amoimt 
of  drudgery  and  toil,  and  the  human  effort  and  time  saved  may 
now  be  devoted  to  other  types  of  work  or  to  enjoyment  and  learn- 
ing. Thousands  who  once  were  needed  for  menial  toil  on  farm  or 
in  shop  and  home  are  now  freed  for  employment  in  satisfying 
new  wants  and  new  pleasures  that  mankind  has  come  to  know, 
or  may  devote  their  time  and  energies  to  forms  of  service  that 
advance  the  welfare  of  mankind  or  minister  to  the  needs  of  the 
hiunan  spirit. 

Despite  certain  unfortunate  results  following  the  change  from 
age-old  working  conditions,  the  century  of  transition  has  seen  the 
laboring  man  making  gains  unknown  before  in  history,  and  the 
peasant  has  seen  the  abolition  of  serfdom  and  feudal  dues. 
Homes  have  gained  tremendously.  The  drudgery  and  wasteful 
toil  have  been  greatly  mitigated.  To-day  there  is  a  standard  of 
comfort  and  sanitation,  even  for  those  in  the  humblest  circum- 
stances, beyond  all  previous  conceptions.  The  poorest  workman 
to-day  can  enjoy  in  his  home  lighting  undreamed  of  in  the  days  of 
tallow  candles ;  warmth  beyond  the  power  of  the  old  smoky  soft- 
coal  grate;  food  of  a  variety  and  quality  his  ancestors  never  knew; 


4o8        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

kitchen  conveniences  and  an  ease  in  kitchen  work  wholly  un- 
known until  recently;  and  sanitary  conveniences  and  conditions 
beyond  the  reach  of  the  wealthiest  half  a  century  ago.  The  caste 
system  in  industry  has  been  broken  down,  and  men  and  their 
children  may  now  choose  their  occupations  freely,  and  move 
about  at  will.  Wages  have  greatly  increased,  both  actually  and 
relatively  to  the  greatly  improved  standard  of  living.  The  work 
of  women  and  children  is  easier,  and  all  work  for  shorter  hours. 
Child  labor  is  fast  being  eliminated  in  all  progressive  nations.  In 
consequence  of  all  these  changes  for  the  better,  people  to-day  have 
a  leisure  for  reading  and  thinking  and  personal  enjoyment  en- 
tirely unknown  before  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century,  and 
governments  everywhere  have  found  it  both  desirable  and  neces- 
sary to  provide  means  for  the  utilization  of  this  leisure  and  the 
gratification  of  the  new  desires.  Along  with  these  changes  has 
gone  the  development  of  the  greatest  single  agent  for  spreading 
liberalizing  ideas  — ■  the  modern  newspaper  —  "  the  most  inveter- 
ate enemy  of  absolutism  and  reaction."  Despite  censorships, 
suppressions,  and  confiscations,  the  press  has  by  now  established 
its  freedom  in  all  enlightened  lands,  and  the  cylinder  press,  the 
telegraph,  and  the  cable  have  become  "indispensable  adjuncts  to 
the  development  of  that  power  which  every  absolutist  has  come  to 
dread,  and  with  which  every  prime  minister  must  daily  reckon." 

III.  EFFECT  OF  THESE  CHANGES  ON  EDUCATION 

General  result  of  these  changes.  The  general  result  of  the 
vast  and  far-reaching  changes  which  we  have  just  described  is 
that  the  intellectual  and  political  horizon  of  the  working  classes 
has  been  tremendously  broadened;  the  home  has  been  completely 
altered;  children  now  have  much  leisure  and  do  little  labor;  and 
the  common  man  at  last  is  rapidly  coming  into  his  own.  Still 
more,  the  common  man  seems  destined  to  be  the  dominant  force 
in  government  in  the  future.  To  this  end  he  and  his  children 
must  be  educated,  his  wife  and  children  cared  for,  his  home  pro- 
tected, and  governments  must  do  for  him  the  things  which  satisfy 
his  needs  and  advance  his  welfare.  The  days  of  the  rule  of  a 
small  intellectual  class  and  of  government  in  the  interests  of  such 
a  class  have  largely  passed,  and  the  political  equality  which  the 
Athenian  Greeks  first  in  the  western  world  gave  to  the  "citizens" 
of  little  Athens,  the  Industrial  Revolution  has  forced  modern  and 
enlightened  governments  to  give  to  all  their  people.     In  conse- 


EDUCATION  BECOMES  A  NATIONAL  TOOL    409 

quence,  real  democracy  in  government,  education,  justice,  and 
social  welfare  is  now  in  process  of  being  attained  generally,  for  the 
first  time  in  the  history  of  the  world. 

The  effect  of  all  these  changes  in  the  mode  of  living  of  peoples 
is  written  large  on  the  national  life.  The  political  and  industrial 
revolutions  which  have  marked  the  ushering-in  of  the  modern  age 
have  been  far-reaching  in  their  consequences.  The  old  home  life 
and  home  industries  of  an  earlier  period  are  passing,  or  have 
passed,  never  to  return.  Peoples  in  all  advanced  nations  are  rap- 
idly swinging  into  the  stream  of  a  new  and  vastly  more  complex 
world  civilization,  which  brings  them  into  contact  and  competi- 
tion with  the  best  brains  of  all  mankind.  At  the  same  time  a 
great  and  ever-increasing  specialization  of  human  effort  is  taking 
place  on  all  sides,  and  with  new  and  ever  more  difficult  social,  po- 
litical, educational,  industrial,  commercial,  and  human-life  prob- 
lems constantly  presenting  themselves  for  solution.  The  world 
has  become  both  larger  and  smaller  than  it  used  to  be,  and  even 
its  remote  parts  are  now  being  linked  up,  to  a  degree  that  a  cen- 
tury ago  would  not  have  been  deemed  possible,  with  the  future 
welfare  of  the  nations  which  so  long  bore  the  brunt  of  the  struggle 
for  the  preservation  and  advancement  of  civilization. 

These  changes  and  the  school.  It  is  these  vast  and  far-reach- 
ing political,  industrial,  and  social  changes  which  have  been  the 
great  actuating  forces  behind  the  evolution  and  expansion  of  the 
state  school  systems  which  we  have  so  far  described.  The  Ameri- 
can and  French  poHtical  revolutions,  with  their  new  philosophy 
of  political  equality  and  state  control  of  education,  clearly  inaugu- 
rated the  movement  for  taking  over  the  school  from  the  Church 
and  the  making  of  it  an  important  instrument  of  the  State.  The 
extension  of  the  suffrage  to  new  classes  gave  a  clear  political  mo- 
tive for  the  school,  and  to  train  young  people  to  read  and  write 
and  know  the  constitutional  bases  of  liberty  became  a  political 
necessity.  The  industrial  revolution  which  followed,  bringing  in 
its  train  such  extensive  changes  in  labor  and  in  the  conditions 
surrounding  home  and  child  life,  has  since  completely  altered  the 
face  of  the  earlier  educational  problem.  What  was  simple  once 
has  since  become  complex,  and  the  complexity  has  increased  with 
time.  Once  the  ability  to  read  and  write  and  cipher  distinguished 
the  educated  man  from  the  uneducated;  to-day  the  man  or  woman 
who  knows  only  these  simple  arts  is  an  uneducated  person,  hardly 
fit  to  cope  with  the  struggle  for  existence  in  a  modern  world,  and 


410       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

certainly  not  fitted  to  participate  in  the  complex  political  and  in- 
dustrial life  of  which,  in  all  advanced  nations,  he  or  she  to-day- 
forms  a  part. 

It  is  the  attempt  to  remould  the  school  and  to  make  of  it  a 
more  potent  instrument  of  the  State  for  promoting  national  con- 
sciousness (R.  340)  and  political,  social,  and  industrial  welfare 
that  has  been  behind  the  many  changes  and  expansions  and  ex- 
tensions of  education  which  have  marked  the  past  half-century 
in  all  the  leading  world  nations,  and  which  underlie  the  most 
pressing  problems  in  educational  readjustment  to-day.  From 
mere  teaching  institutions,  engaged  in  imparting  a  little  re- 
ligious instruction  and  some  knowledge  of  the  tools  of  learning, 
the  school,  in  all  the  leading  nations,  has  to-day  been  transformed 
into  an  institution  for  advancing  national  welfare.  The  leading 
purpose  now  is  to  train  for  political  and  social  efficiency  in  the 
more  democratic  types  of  governments  being  instituted  among 
peoples,  and  to  impart  to  the  young  those  industrial  and  social 
experiences  once  taught  in  the  home,  the  trades,  and  on  the  farm, 
but  which  the  coming  of  the  factory  system  and  city  life  have 
deprived  them  otherwise  of  knowing. 

Education  a  constructive  national  tool.  One  result  of  the  many 
poHtical,  social,  and  industrial  changes  of  a  century  has  been  to 
evolve  education  into  the  great  constructive  tool  of  modem  po- 
litical society.  For  ages  a  church  and  private  affair,  and  of  no 
great  importance  for  more  than  a  few,  it  has  to-day  become  the 
prime  essential  to  good  government  and  national  progress,  and  is 
so  recognized  by  the  leading  nations  of  the  world.  As  people  are 
freed  from  autocratic  rule  and  take  upon  themselves  the  functions 
of  government,  and  as  they  break  loose  from  their  age-old  politi- 
cal, social,  and  industrial  moorings  and  swing  out  into  the  current 
of  the  stream  of  modern  world-civilization,  the  need  for  the  educa- 
tion of  the  masses  to  enable  them  to  steer  safely  their  ship  of 
state,  and  take  their  places  among  the  stable  governments  of  a 
modem  world,  becomes  painfully  evident.  In  the  hands  of  an  un- 
educated people  a  democratic  form  of  government  is  a  dangerous 
instrument,  while  the  proper  development  of  natural  resources 
and  the  utilization  of  trade  opportunities  by  backward  peoples, 
without  being  exploited,  is  almost  impossible.  In  Russia,  Mex- 
ico, and  the  Central  American  "republics"  we  see  the  results  of  a 
democracy  in  the  hands  of  an  uneducated  people.  There,  too 
often,  the  revolver  instead  of  the  ballot  box  is  used  to  settle  pub- 


EDUCATION  BECOMES  A  NATIONAL  TOOL    411 

lie  issues,  and  instead  of  orderly  government  under  law  we  find 
injustice  and  anarchy.  A  general  system  of  education  that  will 
teach  the  fundamental  principles  of  constitutional  liberty,  and 
apply  science  to  production  in  agriculture  and  manufacturing, 
is  almost  the  only  solution  for  such  conditions. 

Expansion  of  the  educational  idea.  In  all  lands  to-day  where 
there  is  an  intelligent  government,  the  education  of  the  people 
through  a  system  of  state-controlled  schools  is  regarded  as  of  the 
first  importance  in  moulding  and  shaping  the  destinies  of  the  na- 
tion and  promoting  the  country's  welfare.  Beginning  with  edu- 
cation to  impart  the  ability  to  read  and  write  and  cipher,  and  as 
an  aid  to  the  political  side  of  government,  the  education  of  the 
masses  has  been  so  expanded  in  scope  during  the  century  that  to- 
day it  includes  aims,  classes,  types  of  schools,  and  forms  of  service 
scarcely  dreamed  of  at  the  time  the  State  began  to  take  over  the 
school  from  the  Church,  with  a  view  to  extending  elementary  edu- 
cational advantages  and  promoting  literacy  and  citizenship. 
"What  some  of  the  more  important  of  these  expansions  have  been 
we  shall  state  in  a  following  chapter,  but  before  doing  so  let  us  re- 
turn to  another  phase  of  the  problem  —  that  of  the  progress  of 
educational  theory  —  and  see  what  have  been  the  main  lines  of 
this  progress  in  the  theory  as  to  the  educational  purpose  since  the 
time  when  Pestalozzi  formulated  a  theory  for  the  secular  school. 

QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

1.  What  does  the  emphasis  on  the  People's  High  Schools  in  Denmark  indi- 
cate as  to  the  political  status  of  the  common  people  there? 

2.  Explain  the  educational  prominence  of  Finland,  compared  with  its 
neighbor  Russia. 

3.  Show  the  close  relation  between  the  character  of  the  school  system  devel- 
oped in  Japan  and  the  character  of  its  government.    In  China. 

4.  Show  why  the  state-function  conception  of  education  is  destined  to  be 
the  ruling  plan  everywhere. 

5.  Show  the  close  connection  between  the  Industrial  Revolution  and  a 
somewhat  general  diffusion  of  the  fundamental  principles  revealed  by 
the  study  of  science. 

6.  Show  how  the  Industrial  Revolution  has  created  entirely  new  problems 
in  education,  and  what  some  of  t^ese  are. 

7.  Show  the  connection  between  the  Industrial  Revolution  and  political 
enfranchisement. 

8.  Enumerate  some  of  the  educational  problems  we  now  face  that  we  should 
not  have  had  to  deal  with  had  the  Industrial  Revolution  not  taken  place. 

9.  Why  has  the  result  of  these  changes  been  to  extend  the  period  of  depend- 
ence and  tutelage  of  children? 

10.  Outline  an  educational  solution  of  the  problem  of  Mexico.    Of  Russia. 
Of  Persia. 

11.  Describe  the  expansion  of  the  educational  idea  since  the  days  when 
Pestalozzi  formulated  the  theory  for  the  secular  school. 


412        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

12.  Contrast  the  American  and  the  European  secondary  school  in  purpose. 
Why  should  the  American  be  a  free  school,  while  those  in  Europe  are 
tuition  schools? 

13.  Show  why  the  essentially  democratic  school  system  maintained  in  the 
United  States  would  not  be  suited  to  an  autocratic  form  of  government. 

14.  Show  that  the  weight  of  a  priesthood  and  the  force  of  religious  instruc- 
tion in  the  schools  would  be  strong  supports  for  monarchical  forms  of 
government. 

15.  Homogeneous  monarchical  nations  look  after  the  training  of  their  teach- 
ers much  better  than  does  such  a  cosmopolitan  nation  as  the  United 
States.  Why? 

SELECTED  READINGS 

•  In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  illustrative  selections 
are  reproduced: 

333.  Switzerland:  Constitutional  Provisions  as  to  Education  and  Religious 
Freedom. 

334.  Japan:  The  Basic  Documents  of  Japanese  Education. 

(a)  Preamble  to  the  Education  Code  of  1872. 
(6)  Imperial  Rescript  on  Moral  Education, 
(c)  Instructions  as  to  Lessons  on  Morals. 

335.  Ping  Wen  Kuo:  Transformation  of  China  by  Education. 

336.  Mann:  Education  and  National  Prosperity. 

337.  Huxley:  The  Recent  Progress  of  Science. 

338.  Anon. :  Scientific  Knowledge  must  precede  Invention. 

339.  Ticknor:  Illustrating  Early  Lack  of  Communication. 

340.  Monroe:  The  Struggle  for  National  Realization. 

341.  Buisson,  F.:  The  French  Teacher  and  the  National  Spirit. 

342.  Fr.  de  Hovre:  The  German  Emphasis  on  National  Ends. 

343.  Stuntz:  Landing  of  the  Pilgrims  at  Manila 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

*Buisson,  F.  and  Farrington,  F.  E.    French  Educational  Ideals  of  To-day. 
Butler,  N.  M.     "Status  of  Education  at  the  Close  of  the  Century";  in 

Proceedings  National  Education  Association,  1900,  pp.  188-96. 
Davidson,  Thos.     "Education  as  World  Building";  in  Educational  Re- 
view, vol.  XX,  pp.  325-45.     (November,  1900.) 
Doolittle,  Wm.  H.    Inventions  of  the  Century. 

Foster,  M.     "A  Century's  Progress  in  Science";  in  Educational  Review, 
vol.  xvni,  pp.  313-31.     (November,  1899.) 
*Friedel,  V.  H.     The  German  School  as  a  War  Nursery. 
Gibbons,  H.  de  B.    Economic  and  Industrial  Progress  of  the  Century. 
Hughes,  J.  L.,  and  Klemm,  L.  R.    Progress  of  Education  in  the  Nineteenth 
Century. 
*Huxley,  Thos.     "The  Progress  of  Science";  in  his  Methods  and  Results. 
*Kuo,  Ping  Wen.     The  Chinese  System  of  Public  Education. 
Lewis,  R.  E.     The  Educational  Conquest  of  the  Far  East. 
Macknight,  Thos.     Political  Progress  of  the  Century. 
♦Ross,  E.  A.    "  The  World  Wide  Advance  of  Democracy  " ;  in  his  Changing 
America. 
Routledge,  R.     A  Popular  History  of  Science. 
Sandiford,  Peter,  Editor.     Comparative  Education. 
♦Sedgwick,  W.  T.,  and  Tyler,  H.  W.     A  Short  History  of  Science. 
♦Thwing,  C.  F.     Education  in  the  Far  East. 
Webster,  W.  C.    General  History  of  Commerce. 
White,  A.  D.     The  Warfare  of  Science  and  Theology. 


CHAPTER  XXVIII 
NEW  CONCEPTIONS  OF  THE  EDUCATIONAL  PROCESS 

I.  THE  PSYCHOLOGICAL  ORGANIZATION  OF  ELEMENTARY 
INSTRUCTION 

The  beginnings  of  normal-school  training.  The  training  of 
would-be  teachers  for  the  work  of  instruction  is  an  entirely  mod- 
ern proceeding.  The  first  normal  school  established  anywhere 
was  that  founded  at  Rheims,  in  northern  France,  in  1685,  by  Abbe 
de  la  Salle  (p.  183) .  He  had  founded  the  Order  of  "  The  Brothers 
of  the  Christian  Schools"  the  preceding  year,  to  provide  free  re- 
ligious instruction  for  children  of  the  working  classes  in  France 
(R.  182),  and  he  conceived  the  new  idea  of  creating  a  special 
school  to  train  his  prospective  teachers  for  the  teaching  work  of 
his  Order.  In  addition  to  imparting  a  general  education  of  the 
type  of  the  time,  and  a  thorough  grounding  in  religion,  his  student 
teachers  were  trained  to  teach  in  practice  schools,  under  the 
direction  of  experienced  teachers.    This  was  an  entirely  new  idea. 

The  beginnings  elsewhere,  as  we  have  previously  pointed  out 
were  made  in  German  lands,  Francke's  Seminarium  Praceptorum, 
established  at  Halle  in  169X,  coming  next  in  point  of  time. 
In  1738  Johann  Julius  Hecker  (1707-68),  one  of  Francke's  teach- 
ers at  Halle,  established  the  first  regular  Seminary  for  Teach- 
ers in  Prussia,  and  in  1748  he  established  a  private  Lehrer- 
seminar  in  Berlin.  In  these  two  institutions  he  first  showed  the 
German  people  the  possibilities  of  special  training  for  secondary- 
school  teachers.  Something  like  a  dozen  Teachers'  Seminaries 
had  been  founded  in  German  lands  before  the  close  of  the  eight- 
eenth century.  A  normal  school  was  established  in  Denmark, 
by  royal  decree,  as  early  as  1789,  and  five  additional  schools 
when  the  law  organizing  public  instruction  in  Denmark  was 
enacted,  in  1814.  In  France  the  beginnings  of  state  action  came 
with  the  action  of  the  National  Convention,  which  decreed  the 
establishment  of  the  "Superior  Normal  School  for  France,"  in 
1794  (p.  328).  This  institution,  though,  was  short  lived,  and  the 
real  beginnings  of  the  French  higher  normal  school  awaited  the 
reorganizing  work  of  Napoleon,  in  1808  (p.  328;  R.  283). 

The  schools  just  mentioned  represent  the  first  institutions  in 


414        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

the  history  of  the  world  organized  for  the  purpose  of  training 
teachers  to  teach.  The  teachers  they  trained  were  intended  pri- 
marily for  the  secondary  schools,  and  the  training  given  was  largely 
academic  in  character.  So  long  as  the  instruction  in  the  vernacu- 
lar school  consisted  chiefly  of  reading  and  the  Catechism,  and  of 
hearing  pupils  recite  what  they  had  memorized,  there  was  of 
course  but  little  need  for  any  special  training  for  the  teachers. 
It  was  not  until  after  Pestalozzi  had  done  his  work  and  made  his 
contribution  that  there  was  anything  worth  mentioning  to  train 
teachers  for. 

Pestalozzi's  contribution.  The  memorable  work  done  by 
Pestalozzi  in  Switzerland,  during  his  quarter-century  (1800-25) 
of  effort  at  Burgdorf  and  Yverdon,  changed  the  whole  face  of  the 
preparation  of  teachers  problem.  His  work  was  so  fundamental 
that  it  completely  redirected  the  education  of  children.  Taking 
the  seed-thought  of  Rousseau  that  sense-impression  was  "the 
only  true  foundation  of  human  knowledge"  (R.  267),  he  enlarged 
this  to  the  conception  of  the  mental  development  of  human 
bemgs  as  bemg  organic,  and  proceeding  according  to  law.  His 
extension  of  this  idea  of  Rousseau's  led  him  to  declare  that  educa- 
tion was  an  individual  development,\a  drawing-out  and  not  a 
pouring-in;  that  the  basis  of  all  education  exists  in  the  nature  of 
man;  and  that  the  method  of  education  is  to  be  sought  and  con- 
structed. These  were  his  great  contributions.  These  ideas 
fitted  in  well  with  the  rising  tide  of  individualism  which  marked 
the  late  eighteenth  and  the  early  nineteenth  centuries,  and  upon 
these  contributions  the  modern  secular  elementary  school  has 
been  built. 

These  ideas  led  Pestalozzi  to  emphasize  sense  perception  and 
expression;  to  formulate  the  rule  that  in  teaching  we  must  pro- 
ceed from  the  concrete  to  the  abstract;  and  to  construct  a  "fac- 
ulty psychology"  which  conceived  of  education  as  "a  harmoni- 
ous development"  of  the  different  "faculties"  of  the  mind.  He 
also  tried,  unsuccessfully  to  be  sure,  to  so  organize  the  teaching 
process  that  eventually  it  could  be  so  "mechanized"  that  there 
would  be  a  regular  A,  B,  C,  for  each  type  of  instruction,  which, 
once  learned,  would  give  perfection  to  a  teacher.  Largely  out 
of  these  ideas  and  the  new  direction  he  gave  to  instruction  the 
modern  normal  school  for  training  teachers  for  the  elementary 
schools  arose. 

Oral  and  objective  teaching  developed.     Up  to  the  time  of 


NEW  CONCEPTIONS  OF  EDUCATION      415 

Pestalozzi,  and  for  years  after  he  had  done  his  work,  in  many- 
lands  and  places  the  instruction  of  children  continued  to  be  of 
the  memorization  of  textbook  matter  and  of  the  recitation  type. 
The  children  learned  what  was  down  in  the  book,  and  recited  the 
answers  to  the  teacher.  Many  of  the  early  textbooks  were  con 
structed  on  the  plan  of  the  older  Catechism  —  that  is,  on  a  ques- 
tion and  answer  plan  (R.  351  a).  There  was  nothing  for  children 
to  do  but  to  memorize  such  text  book  material,  or  for  the  teacher 
but  to  see  that  the  pupils  knew  the  answers  to  the  questions.  It 
was  school-keeping,  not  teaching,  that  teachers  were  engaged  in. 

The  form  of  instruction  worked  out  by  Pestalozzi,  based  on 
sense-perception,  reasoning,  and  individual  judgment,  called  for  a 
complete  change  in  classroom  procedure.  '-■  What  Pestalozzi  tried 
most  of  all  to  do  was  to  get  children  to  use  their  senses  and  their 
minds,  to  look  carefully,  to  count,  to  observe  forms,  to  get,  by 
means  of  their  five  important  senses,  clear  impressions  and  ideas 
as  to  objects  and  life  in  the  world  about  them,  and  then  to  think 
over  what  they  had  seen  and  be  able  to  answer  his  questions,  be- 
cause they  had  observed  carefully  and  reasoned  clearly.  Pesta- 
lozzi thus  clearly  subordinated  the  printed  book  to  the  use  of 
the  child's  senses,  and  the  repetition  of  mere  words  to  clear 
ideas  about  things.  Pestalozzi  thus  became  one  of  the  first  real 
teachers. 

This  was  an  entirely  new  process,  and  for  the  first  time  in  his- 
tory a  real  ''technique  of  instruction"  was  now  called  for.  De- 
pendence on  the  words  of  the  text  could  no  longer  be  rehed  upon. 
The  oral  instruction  of  a  class  group,  using  real  objects,  called  for 
teaching  skill.  The  class  must  be  kept  naturally  interested  and 
under  control;  the  essential  elements  to  be  taught  must  be  kept 
clearly  in  the  mind  of  the  teacher;  the  teacher  must  raise  the  right 
kind  of  questions,  in  the  right  order,  to  carry  the  class  thinking 
along  to  the  right  conclusions;  and,  since  so  much  of  this  type  of 
instruction  was  not  down  in  books,  it  called  for  a  much  more  ex- 
tended knowledge  of  the  subject  on  the  part  of  the  teacher  than 
the  old  type  of  school-keeping  had  done.  The  teacher  must  now 
both  know  and  be  able  to  organize  and  direct.  Class  lessons 
must  be  thought  out  in  advance,  and  teacher-preparation  in  itself 
meant  a  great  change  in  teaching  procedure.  Emancipated  from 
dependence  on  the  words  of  a  text,  and  able  to  stand  before  a  class 
full  of  a  subject  and  able  to  question  freely,  teachers  became  con- 
scious of  a  new  strength  and  a  professional  skill  unknown  in  the 


4i6       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

days  of  textbook  reciting.  Out  of  such  teaching  came  oral  lan- 
guage lessons,  drill  in  speech  usage,  elementary  science  instruc- 
tion, observational  geography,  mental  arithmetic,  music,  and 
drawing,  to  add  to  the  old  instruction  in  the  Catechism,  reading, 
writing,  and  ciphering,  and  all  these  new  subjects,  taught  accord- 
ing to  Pestalozzian  ideas  as  to  purpose,  called  for  an  individual 
technique  of  instruction. 

The  normal  school  finds  its  place.     These  new  ideas  of  Pesta- 
lozzi  proved  so  important  that  during  the  first  five  or  six  decades 


Fig.  98.  The  First  Modern  Normal  School 

The  old  castle  at  Yverdon,  where  Pestalozzi's  Institute  was  conducted  and  his 
greatest  success  achieved. 


of  the  nineteenth  century  the  elementary  school  was  made  over. 
The  new  conception  of  the  child  as  a  slowly  developing  personal- 
ity, demanding  subject-matter  and  method  suited  to  his  stage  of 
development,  and  the  new  conception  of  teaching  as  that  of  di- 
recting mental  development  instead  of  hearing  recitations  and 
"keeping  school,"  now  replaced  the  earlier  knowledge-conception 
of  school  work.  Where  before  the  ability  to  organize  and  dis- 
cipline a  school  had  constituted  the  chief  art  of  instruction,  now 
the  ability  to  teach  scientifically  took  its  place  as  the  prime  pro- 
fessional requisite.    A  "science  and  art"  of  teaching  now  arose; 


NEW  CONCEPTIONS  OF  EDUCATION      417 

methodology  soon  became  a  great  subject;  the  new  subject  of 
pedagogy  began  to  take  form  and  secure  recognition;  and  psy- 
chology became  the  guiding  science  of  the  school.  As  these 
changes  took  place,  the  normal  school  began  to  come  into  favor 
in  the  leading  countries  of  Europe  and  in  the  United  States,  and 
in  time  has  established  itself  everywhere  as  an  important  edu- 
cational institution. 

On  July  3,  1839,  the  first  state  normal  school  in  the  United 
States  opened  in  the  town  hall  at  Lexington,  Massachusetts,  with 
one  teacher  and  three  students.  Later  that  same  year  a  second 
state  normal  school  was  opened  at  Barre,  and  early  the  next  year 
a  third  at  Bridgewater,  both  in  Massachusetts.  For  these  the 
State  Board  of  Education  adopted  a  statement  as  to  entrance  re- 
quirements and  a  course  of  instruction  (R.  350  b)  which  shows 
well  the  jacademic  character  of  these  early  teaching  institutions. 
Their  success  was  largely  due  to  the  enthusiastic  support  given 
the  new  idea  by  Horace  Mann.  In  an  address  at  the  dedication 
of  the  first  building  erected  in  America  for  normal-school  purposes, 
in  1846,  he  expressed  his  deep  belief  as  to  the  fundamental  im- 
portance of  such  institutions  (R.  350  c).  By  i860  eleven  state 
normal  schools  had  been  established  in  eight  of  the  States  of  the 
American  Union,  and  six  private  schools  were  also  rendering  simi- 
lar services.  Closely  related  was  the  Teachers'  Institute,  first 
definitely  organized  by  Henry  Barnard  in  Connecticut,  in  1839, 
to  offer  four-  to  six-weeks  summer  courses  for  teachers  in  service, 
and  these  had  been  organized  in  fifteen  of  the  American  States  by 
i860.  Since  1870  the  establishment  of  state  normal  schools  has 
been  rapid  in  the  United  States,  two  hundred  having  been  estab- 
lished by  1910,  and  many  since.  The  United  States,  though,  is  as 
yet  far  from  having  a  trained  body  of  teachers  for  its  elementary 
schools.  For  the  high  schools,  it  is  only  since  about  1890  that  the 
professional  training  of  teachers  for  such  service  has  really  been 
begun. 

Spread  of  the  normal-school  idea.  The  movement  for  the 
creation  of  normal  schools  to  train  teachers  for  the  elementary 
schools  has  in  time  spread  to  many  nations.  As  nation  after  na- 
tion has  awakened  to  the  desirability  of  establishing  a  system  of 
modern-type  state  schools,  a  normal  school  to  train  leaders  has 
often  been  among  the  first  of  the  institutions  created.  The 
normal  school,  in  consequence,  is  found  to-day  in  all  the  conti- 
nental European  States;  in  all  the  English  self-governing  domin- 


4i8        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

ions;  in  nearly  all  the  South  American  States;  and  in  China, 
Japan,  Siam,  the  Philippines,  Cuba,  Algiers,  India,  and  other  less 
important  nations.  In  all  these  there  is  an  attempt,  often  reach- 
ing as  yet  to  but  a  small  percentage  of  the  teachers,  to  extend  to 
them  some  of  that  training  in  the  theory  and  art_of  instruction 
which  has  for  long  been  so  important  a  feature  of  the  education  of 
the  elernentary  teacher  in  the  German  States,  France,  and  the 
United  States.  Since  about  1890  other  nations  have  also  begun 
to  provide,  as  the  German  States  and  France  have  done  for  so 
long,  some  form  of  professional  training  for  the  teachers  intended 
for  their  secondary  schools  as  well. 

Psychology  becomes  the  master  science.  Everywhere  the  es- 
tablishment of  normal  schools  has  meant  the  acceptance  of  the 
newer  conceptions  as  to  child  development  and  the  nature  of  the 
educational  process.  These  are  that  the  child  is  a  slowly,  develop- 
ing personality,  needing  careful  study,  and  demanding  subject- 
matter  and  method  suited  to  his  different  stages  of  development. 
The  new  conception  of  teaching  as  that  of  directing  and  guiding 
the  education  of  a  child,  instead  of  hearing  recitations  and  "keep- 
ing school,"  in  time  replaced  the  earlier  knowledge-conception  of 
school  work.  Psychology  accordingly  became  the  guiding  science 
of  the  school,  and  the  imparting  to  prospective  teachers  proper 
ideas  as  to  psychological  procedure,  and  the  proper  methodology 
of  instruction  in  each  of  the  different  elementary-school  subjects, 
became  the  great  work  of  the  normal  school.  Teachers  thus 
trained  carried  into  the  schools  a  new  conception  as  to  the  nature 
of  childhood;  a  new  and  a  minute  methodology  of  instruction; 
and  a  new  enthusiasm  for  teaching;  —  all  of  which  were  impot: 
tant  additions  to  school  work. 

A  new  methodology  was  soon  worked  out  for  all  the  subjects 
of  instruction,  both  old  and  new.  The  centuries-old  alphabet 
method  of  teaching  reading  was  superseded  by  the  word  and 
sound  methods;  the  new  oral  language  instruction  was  raised  to  a 
position  of  first  importance  in  developing  pupil- thinking;  spelling, 
word-analysis,  and  sentence-analysis  were  given  much  emphasis 
in  the  work  of  the  school;  the  Pestalozzian  mental  arithmetic 
came  as  an  important  addition  to  the  old  ciphering  of  sums;  the 
old  writing  from  copies  was  changed  into  a  drill  subject,  requiring 
careful  teaching  for  its  mastery;  the  "back  to  nature"  ideas  of 
Rousseau  and  Pestalozzi  proved  specially  fruitful  in  the  new  study 
of  geography,  which  called  for  observation  out  of  doors,  the  study 


NEW  CONCEPTIONS  OF  EDUCATION      419 

of  type  forms,  and  the  substitution  of  the  physical  and  human 
aspects  of  geography  for  the  older  political  and  statistical;  object 
lessons  on  natural  objects,  and  later  science  and  nature  study, 
were  used  to  introduce  children  to  a  knowledge  of  nature  and  to 
train  them  in  thinking  and  observation;  while  the  new  subjects  of 
music  and  drawing  came  in,  each  with  an  elaborate  technique  of 
instruction. 

By  1875  the  normal  school  in  all  lands  was  finding  plenty  to  do, 
and  feactuDg,  by  the  new  methods  and  according  to  the  new  psy- 
chgiogic^l^rocedyTe^^emed  td^ihaiiy  6ne~of  the  most  wonderful 
and  most  important  occupations  in  the  worldT         ' 

II.  NEW  IDEAS  FROM  HERBARTIAN  SOURCES 

The  work  of  Herbart.  Taking  up  the  problem  as  Pestalozzi 
left  it,  a  German  by  the  name  of  Johann  Friedrich  Herbart  (1776- 
1841)  carried  it  forward  by  organizing  a  truer  psychology  for  the 
whole  educational  process,  by  erecting  a  new  social  aim  for  in- 
struction, by  formulating  new  steps  in  method,  and  by  showing 
the  place  and  the  importance  of  properly  organized  instruction  in 
history  and  literature  in  the  education  of  the  child.  Though  the 
two  men  were  entirely  different  in  type,  and  worked  along  en- 
tirely different  lines,  the  connection  between  Herbart  and  Pesta- 
lozzi was,  nevertheless,  close. 

The  two  men,  however,  approached  the  educational  problem 
from  entirely  different  angles.  Pestalozzi  gave  nearly  all  his  long 
life  to  teaching  and  human  service,  while  Herbart  taught  only  as 
a  traveling  private  tutor  for  three  years,  and  later  a  class  of 
twenty  children  in  his  unixgrgity  practice  school.  Pestalozzi  was 
a  social  reformer,  a  visionary,  and  an  impractical  enthusiast,  but 
was  possessed  of  a  remarkable  intuitive  insight  into  child  nature. 
Herbart,  on  the  other  hand,  was  a  well-trained  scholarly  thinker, 
who  spent  the  most  of  his  life  in  the  peaceful  occupation  of  a  pro- 
fessor of  philosophy  in  a  German  university.  It  was  while  at 
Konigsberg,  between  18 10  and  1832,  and  as  an  appendix  to  his 
work  as  professor  of  philosophy,  that  he  organized  a  small  prac- 
tice school,  conducted  a  Pedagogical  Seminar,  and  worked  out  his 
educational  theory  and  method.  His  work  was  a  careful,  schol- 
arly attempt  at  the  organization  of  education  as  a  science,  carried 
out  amid  the  peace  and  quiet  which  a  university  atmosphere  al- 
most alone  affords.  He  addressed  himself  chiefly  to  three  things: 
(i)  the  aim,  (2)  the  content,  and  (3)  the  method  of  instruction. 


420       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

The  aim  and  the  content  of  education.  Locke  had  set  up  as 
the  aim  of  education  the  ideal  of  a  physically  sound  gentleman. 
Rousseau  had  declared  his  aim  to  be  to  prepare  his  boy  for  life, 
by  developing  naturally  his  inborn  capacities.  PesLalozzi  had 
sought  to  regenerate  society  by  means  of  education,  and  to  pre- 
pare children  for  society  by  a  ''harmonious  training"  of  their 
"faculties."  Herbart  rejected  alike  the  conventional-social  edu- 
cation of  Locke,  the  natural  and  unsocial  education  of  Rousseaji, 
and  the  "faculty-psychology"  conception  of  education  of  Pesta- 
lozzi.  Instead  he  conceived  of  the  mind  as  a  unity,  instead  of  be- 
ing divided  into  "faculties,"  and  the  aim  of  education  as  broadly 
social  rather  than  personal.  The  purpose  of  education,  he  said, 
was  to  prepare  men  to  live  properly  in  organized  society,  and 
hence  the  chief  aim  in  education  was  not  conventional  fitness, 
natural  development,  mere  knowledge,  nor  personal  mental 
power,  but  personal  character  and  social  morality.  This  being 
the  case,  the  educator  should  analyze  the  interests  and  occupa- 
tions and  social  responsibilities  of  men  as  they  are  grouped  in  or- 
ganized society,  and,  from  such  analyses,  deduce  the  means  and 
the  method  of  instruction.  Man's  interests,  he  said,  come  from 
two  main  sources  —  his  contact  with  the  things  in  his  environ- 
ment (real,  thmgs,  sense-impressions) ,  and  from  his  relations  with 
human  beings  (social  intercourse).  His  social  responsibilities  and 
duties  are  determined  by  the  nature  of  the  social  organization  of 
which  he  forms  a  part. 

Pestalozzi  had  provided  fairly  well  for  the  first  group  of  con- 
tacts, through  his  instruction  in  objects,  home  geography,  num- 
bers, and  geometric  form.  For  the  second  group  of  contacts 
Pestalozzi  had  developed  only  oral  language,  and  to  this  Herbart 
now  added  the  two  important  studies  of  literature  and  history, 
and  history  with  the  emphasis  on  the  social  rather  than  the  politi- 
cal side.  Two  new  elementary-school  subjects  were  thus  devel- 
oped, each  important  in  revealing  to  man  his  place  in  the  social 
whole.  History  in  particular  Herbart  conceived  to  be  a  study  of 
the  first  importance  for  revealing  proper  human  relationsHps, 
and  leading  men  to  social  and  national  "  good- will." 

The  chief  purpose  of  education  Herbart  held  to  be  to  develop 
personal  character  and  to  prepare  for  social  usefulness  (R.  355). 
These  virtues,  he  held,  proceeded  from  enough  of  the  right  kind  of 
knowledge,  properly  interpreted  to  the  pupil  so  that  clear  ideasas 
to  relationships  might  be  formed.     To  impart  this  knowledge  in- 


NEW  CONCEPTIONS  OF  EDUCATION     421 

terest  must  be  awakened,  and  to  arouse  interest  in  the  many  kinds 
of  knowledge  needed,  a  ''many-sided"  development  must  take 
place.  From  full  knowledge,  and  with  proper  instruction  by  the 
teacher,  clear  ideas  or  concepts  might  be  formed,  and  clear  ideas 
ought  to  lead  to  right  action,  and  right  aclion  to  personal  charac- 
ter —  the  aim  of  all  instruction.  Herbert  was  the  first  writer  on 
education  to  place  the  great  empha,sis  on  proper  instruction,  and 
to  exalt  teaching  and  proper  teaching-procedure  instead  of  mere 
knowledge  or  intellectual  discipline.  He  thus  conceived  of  the 
educational  process  as  a  science  in  itself,  having  a  definite  content 
and  method,  and  worthy  of  special  study  by  those  who  desire  to 
teach. 

Herbartian  method.  With  these  ideas  as  to  the  aim  and  con- 
tent of  instruction,  Herbart  worked  out  a  theory  of  the  instruc- 
tional process  and  a  method  of  instruction  (R.  356).  Interest  he 
held  to  be  of  first  importance  as  a  prerequisite  to  good  instruc- 
tion. If  given  spontaneously,  well  and  good;  but,  if  necessary, 
forced  interest  must  be  resorted  to.  SkUl  in  instruction  is  in  part 
to  be  determined  by  the  ability  of  the  teacher  to  secure  interest 
without  resorting  to  force  on  the  one  hand  or  sugar-coating  of  the 
subject  on  the  other.  Taking  Pestalozzi's  idea  that  the  purpose 
of  the  teacher  was  to  give  pupils  new  experiences  through  contacts 
with  real  things,  without  assuming  that  the  pupils  already  had 
such,  Herbart  elaborated  the  process  by  which  new  knowledge  is 
assimilated  in  terms  of  what  one  already  knpws,  and  from  his 
elaboration  of  this  principle  the  doctrine  of  apperception  —  that 
is,  the  apperceiving  or  comprehending  of  new  knowledge  in  terms 
of  the  old  —  has  been  fixed  as  an  important  principle  in  educa- 
tional psychology.  Good  instruction,  then,  involves  first  putting 
the  child  into  a  proper  frame  of  mind  to  apperceive  the  new 
knowledge,  and  hence  this  becomes  a  corner-stone  of  all  good 
teaching  method. 

Herbart  did  not  always  rely  on  such  methods,  holding  that  the 
** conimitting  to  memory"  of  certain  necessary  facts  often  was 
necessary,  but  he  held  that  the  mere  memorizing  of  isolated  facts, 
which  had  characterized  school  Instruction  f o£_ages,  had,  little 
value  for  either  educational  or  moral  ends.  The  te5,ching  of  mere 
facts  often  was  very  necessary,  but  siich  instruction  called  for  a 
methodical  organization  of  the  facts  by  the  teacher,  so  as  to  make 
their  learning  contribute  to  some  definite  purpose.  This  called 
for  a  purpose  in  instruction;  the  organization  of  the  facts  neces- 


422        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

sary  to  be  taught  so  as  to  select  the  most  useful  ones;  the  connec- 
tion of  these  so  as  to  establish  the  principle  which  was  the  purpose 
of  the  instruction;  and  training  in  systematic  thinking  by  apply- 
ing the  principle  to  new  problems  of  the  type  being  studied.  The 
carrying-out  of  such  ideas  meant  the  careful  organization  of  the 
tQaching  process  and  teaching  method,  to  secure  certain  prede- 
termined ends  in  child  development,  instead  of  mere  miscella- 
neous memorizing  and  school-keeping. 

The  Herbartian  movement  in  Germany.  Herbart  died  in  1841, 
without  having  awakened  any  general  interest  in  his  ideas,  and 
they  remained  virtually  unnoticed  until  1865.  In  that  year  a  pro- 
fessor at  Leipzig,  Tuiskon  Ziller  (1817-1883),  published  a  book 
setting  forth  Herbart's  idea  of  instruction  as  a  moral  force.  This 
attracted  much  attention,  and  led  to  the  formation  (1868)  of  a 
scientific  society  for  the  study  of  Herbart's  ideas.  Ziller  and  his 
followers  now  elaborated  Herbart's  ideas,  advanced  the  theory  of 
culture-epochs  in  child  development,  the  theory  of  concentration 
in  studies,  and  elaborated  the  four  steps  in  the  process  of  in- 
struction, as  described  by  Herbart,  into  the  five  formal  steps 
of  the  modern  Herbartian  school. 

In  1874  a  pedagogical  seminary  and  practice  school  was  organ- 
ized at  the  University  of  Jena,  and  in  1885  this  came  under  the 
direction  of  Professor  William  Rein,  a  pupil  of  Ziller's,  who  de- 
veloped the  practice  school  according  to  the  ideas  of  Ziller.  A 
detailed  course  of  study  for  this  school,  filling  two  large  voLunies, 
was  worked  out,  and  the  practice  lessons  given  were  thoroughly 
plaimed  beforehand  and  the  niethods  employed  were  subjected  to 
a  searching  analysis  after  the  lesson  had  been  given. 

Herbartian  ideas  in  the  United  States.  For  a  time,  under  the 
inspiration  of  Ziller  and  Rein,  Jena  became  an  educational  center 
to  which  students  went  from  many  lands.  From  the  work  at  Jena 
Herbartian  ideas  have  spread  which  have  modified  elementary 
educational  procedure  generally.  In  particular  did  the  work  at 
Jena  make  a  deep  ipipression  in  the  United  States.  Between  1885 
and  1890  a  number  of  Americans  studied  at  Jena  and,  returning, 
brought  back  to  the  United  States  this  Ziller-Rein-Jena  brand  of 
Herbartian  ideas  and  practices.  From  the  first  the  new  ideas 
met  with  enthusiastic  approval. 

New  methods  of  instruction  in  history  and  literature,  and  a 
new  psychology,  were  now  added  to  the  nonnal-school  profes- 
sional instruction.     Though  this  psychology  has  since  been  out- 


d 


NEW  CONCEPTIONS  OF  EDUCATION     423 

grown  (R.  357),  it  has  been  very  useful  in  shaping  pedagogical 
thought.  New  courses  of  study  for  the  training::SchQDls  were  now 
worked  out  in  which  the  elementary::sdioal-subjects  were  divided 
into  drill  subjects,  content  subjects,  and  motor-activity  subjects.  Q 
Apperception,  interest,  correlation,  social  purpose,  moral  educa- 
tion, citizenship,  training,  and  recitation -methods  became  new 
terms  to  conjure  with.  From  the  ngrinaL  schools  these  ideas 
spread  rapidly  to  the  better  city  school  systems  of  the  time,  and 
soon  found  their  way  into  courses  of  study  everywhere.  Practice 
schools  and  the  model  lessons  in  dozens  of  nonnal  schools  were  re- 
modeled after  the  pattern  of  those  at  Jena,  and  for  a  decade  Her- 
bartian  ideas  and  the  new  child  study  vied  with  one  another  for 
the  place  of  first  importance  in  educational  thinking.  The  Her- 
bartian  wave  of  the  nineties  resembled  the  Pestalozzian  enthu- 
siasm of  the  sixties.  Each  for  a  time  furnished  the  new  ideas  in 
education,  each  introduced  elements  of  importance  into  the  ele- 
mentary-school instruction,  each  deeply  influenced  the  training  of 
teachers  in  normal  schools  by  giving  a  new  turn  to  the  instruction 
there,  and  each  gradually  settled  down  into  its  proper  place  in 
educational  practice  and  history. 

•The  Herbartian  contribution.  To  the  Herbartians  we  are  in- 
debted in  particular  for  important  new  con«;ptions  as  to  the 
teaching  of  history  and  literature,  which  have  modiJied  all  our 
subsequent  procedure ;  for  the  introduction  of  hi_story  teaching  in 
some  form  into  all  the  elementary-school  grades ;  for  the  emphasis 
on  a  new  social  point  of  view  in  the  teaching  of  history  and  geog- 
raphy; for  the  new  emphasis  on  the  moral  aim  in  instruction;  for  a 
new  and  a  truer  educational  psychology;  and  for  a  better  organic 
zation  of  the  technique  of  classroom  instruction.  In  particular 
Herbart  gave  emphasis  to  that  part  of  educational  development 
which  comes  from  without  —  environment  acting  upon  the  child 
—  as  contrasted  with  the  emphasis  Pestalozzi  had  placed  on  men- 
tal development  from  within  and  according  to  organic  law.     With 

*  The  studies  which  have  come  to  characterize  the  modem  elementary  school 
may  now  be  classified  under  the  following  headings:  » 


Drill  subjects 

Content  subjects 

Expression  subjects 

Reading 

Writing 

Spelling 

Language 

Arithmetic 

Literature 

Geography 

History 

Civic  Studies 

Manners  and  Conduct 

Nature  Study 

Agriculture 

Kindergarten  Work 
Music 

Manual  Arts 
Domestic  Arts 
Plays  and  Games 
School  Gardening 
Vocational  Subjects 

424       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

the  introduction  of  normal  child  activities,  which  came  from 
another  source  about  this  same  time,  the  elementary-school  cur- 
riculum as  we  now  have  it  was  practically  complete,  and  the  ele- 
mentary school  of  1850  was  completely  made  over  to  form  the 
elementary  school  of  the  beguming  of  the  twentieth  century. 

III.  THE  KINDERGARTEN,  PLAY,  AND  MANUAL  ACTIVITIES 

To  another  German,  Friedrich  Froebel  (178 2-1 8 5  2),  v/e  are  in- 
debted, directly  or  indirectly,  for  three  other  additions  to  ele- 
mentary education  —  the  kindergarten,  the  play  idea,  and  hand- 
work activities. 

Origin  of  the  kindergarten.  Of  German  parentage,  the  son  of  a 
rural  clergyman,  early  estranged  from  his  parents,  retiring  and 
introspective  by  nature,  having  led  a  most  unhappy  childhood, 
and  apprenticed  to  a  forester  without  his  wishes  being  consulted, 
at  twenty-three  Froebel  decided  to  become  a  schoolteacher  and 
visited  Pestalozzi  in  Switzerland.  Two  years  later  he  became  the 
tutor  of  three  boys,  and  then  spent  the  years  18083-103,5  a  student 
and  teacher  in  Pestalozzi's  Institute  ^t  Yverdon.  During  his 
years  there  Froebel  was  deeply  impressed  with  the  great  value  of 
music  and  play  in  the  education  of  children,  and  of  all  that  Jie 
carried  away  from  Pestalozzi's  institution  these  ideas  were  most 
persistent.  After  serving  in  a  variety  of  occupations  —  student, 
soldier  against  Napoleon,  and  curator  in  a  museum  of  mineralogy 
—  he  finally  opened  a  little  private  school,  in  i8je6,  which  he  con- 
ducted for  a  decade  along  Pestalozzian  lines.  In  this  the  play 
idea,  music,  and  the  self-activity  of  the  pupils  were  uppermost. 
The  school  was  a  failure,  financially,  but  while  conducting  it 
Froebel  thought  out  and  published  (1826)  his  most  important 
pedagogical  work  —  The  Education  of  Man. 

Gradually  Froebel  became  convinced  that  the  most  needed  re- 
form in  educatioji  concerned  the  early  years  of  childhood.  His 
own  youth  had  been  most  unhappy,  and  to  this  phase  of  education 
he  now  addressed  himself.  After  a  period  as  a  teacher  in  Switzer- 
land he  returned  to  Germany  and  opened  a  school  for  little  chil- 
dren in  which  plays,  games,  songs,  and  occupations  involving  self- 
activity  were  the  dominating  characteristics,  and  in  1840  he  hit 
upon  the  name  Kindergarten  for  it.  In  1843  his  Mutter-  und 
Kose-Lieder,  a  book  of  fifty  songs  and  games,  was  published. 
This  has  been  translated  into  almost  all  languages. 

Spread  of  the  kindergarten  idea.    After  a  series  of  unsuccessful 


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NEW  CONCEPTIONS  OF  EDUCATION      425 

efforts  to  bring  his  new  idea  to  the  attention  of  educators,  Froebel, 
himself  rather  a  fejjiinine  type,  became  discouraged  and  resolved 
to  address  himself  henceforth  to  women,  as  they  seemed  much 
more  capable  of  understandings  him,  and  to  the  training  of  teach- 
ers in  the  new  ideas.     Froebel  was  fortunate  in  securing  as  one 
of  his  most  ardent  disciples,  just  before  his  death,  the  Baroness 
Bertha  von  Marenholtz  Bulow-Wendhausen  (1810-93),  who  did 
more  than  any  other  person  to  make  his  work  known.     Meeting, 
in  1849,  the  man  mentioned  to  her  as  "an  old  fool/'  she  under- 
stood him,  and  spent  the  remainder  of  her  life  in  bringing  to  the 
attention  of  the  world  the  work  of  this  unworldly  man  who  did- 
not  know  how  to  make  it  known  for  himseff.    In  185 1  the  Prus-    j 
sjan  Government,  fearing  some  revolutionary  designs  in  the  new    [ 
ideaj  and  acting  in  a  manner  thoroughly  characteristic  of  the  po-     I 
litical  reaction  which  by  that  time  had  taken  hold  of  all  German     I 
ofl&cial  life,  forbade  kindergartens  in  Prussia.    The  Baroness  then     | 
went  to  London  and  lectured  there  on  Froebel's  ideas,  organizing  ^ 
kindergartens  in  the  English  "ragged  schools."     Here,  by  con- 
trast, she  met  with  a  cordial  reception.     She  later  expounded 
Froebelian  ideas  in  Paris,  Italy,  Switzerland,  Holland,  Belgium, 
and  (after  i860,  when  the  prohibition  was  removed)  in  Germany. 
In  1820  she  founded  a  kindergarten  training-college  in  Dresden. 
Many  of  her  writings  have  been  translated  into  English,  and  pub- 
lished in  the  United  States. 

Considering  the  importance  of  this  work,  and  the  time  which 
has  since  elapsed,  the  kindergarten  idea  has  made  relatively 
small  progress  on  the  continent  of  Europe.     Its  spirit  does  not 
harmonize  with  autocratic  government.     In  Germany  and  the'^ 
old  Austro-Hungary  it  had  made  but  little  progress  up  to  1914.  ( 
Its  greatest  progress  in  Europe,  perhaps,  has  been  in  democratic^ 
Switzerland.     In  England  and  France,  the  two  great  leaders  in 
democratic  government,  the  Infant-School  development,  which 
came  earlier,  has  prevented  any  marked  growth  of  the  kinder- 
garten.   In  England,  though,  the  Infant  School  has  recently  been 
entirely  transformed  by  the  introduction  into  it  of  the  kinder- 
gartgji  si2irit.     In  France,  infant  education  has  taken  a  some- 
wn2t  different  direction. 

In  the  United  States  the  kindergarten  idea  has  met  with  a  most 
cordial  reception.  In  no  country  in  the  world  has  the  spirit  of  the 
kindergarten  been  so  caught  and  applied  to  school  work,  and 
probably  nowhere  has  the  original  kindergarten  idea  been  so  ex- 


426        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

panded  and  improved.  The  first  kindergarten  in  the  United 
States  was  a  Gerrtian  kindergarten,  established  at  Watertown, 
Wisconsin,  in  1855,  by  Mrs.  Carl  Schurz,  a  pupil  of  Froeiel. 
During  the  next  fifteen  years  some  ten  other  kindergartens  were 
organized  in  German-speaking  communities.  The  first  English- 
speaking  kindergarten  was  opened  privately  in  Boston,  in  i860, 
by  Miss  Elizabeth  Peabody.  In  1868  a  private  training-college 
for  kindergartners  was  opened  in  Boston,  largely  through  Miss 
PealiQdy's  influence,  by  Madame  Matilde  Kriege  and  her  daugh- 
ter, who  had  recently  arrived  from  Germany.  In  1872  Miss 
Marie  Boelte  opened  a  similar  teacher- training  school  in  New 
Yojk  City,  and  in  1873  her  pupil.  Miss  Susan  Blow,  accepted  the 
invitation  of  Superintendent  William  T.  Harris,  of  St.  Louis,  to  go 
there  and  open  the  first  public-school  kindergarten  in  the  United 
States.  "^ 

To-day  the  kindergarten  is  found  in  some  form  in  nearly  all 
countries  in  the  world,  having  been  carried  to  all  continents  by 
missionaries,  educational  enthusiasts,  and  interested  govern- 
ments. Japan  early  adopted  the  idea,  and  China  is  now  begin- 
ning to  do  so. 

The  kindergarten  idea.  The  dominant  idea  in  the  kindergar- 
ten is  natural  but  directed  self -activity,  focused  upon  educational, 
social,  and  moral  ends.  Froebel  believed  in  the  continuity  of  a 
child's  life  from  infancy  onward,  and  that  self_-activity,  deter- 
mined by  the  chUd's  interests  and  desires  and  intelligently  dij^ 
rected,  was  essential  to  the  unfolding  of  the  child's  inborn  capaci- 
ties. He  saw,  more  clearly  than  any  one  before  him  had  done, 
the  unutilized  wealth  of  the  child's  world;  that  the  child's  chief 
characteristic  is  self-activity;  the  desirability  of  the  child  finding 
himself  through  glay;  and  that  the  work  of  the  school  during 
these  early  ye^rs  was  to  supplement  the  family  by  drawing  out 
the  child  and  awakening  the  ideal  side  of  his  nature.  To  these 
ends  doing,  self-activity,  and  expression  became  fundamental  to 
the  kindergarten,  and  movement,  gesture,  directed  play,  song, 
color,  the  story,  and  human  activities  a  part  of  kindergarten 
teobi^U.e.  Nature  s^udy  and  school  gardening  were  given  a 
promiijent  place,  and  motor-activity  much  called  into  play.  Ad- 
vancing far  beyond  Pestalozzi's  principle  of  sense-impressions, 
Froebel  insisted  on  motor-activity  and  learning  by  doing  (R.  358). 

rroebel,  as  well  as  Herbart,  also  saw  the  social  importance  of 
education,  and  that  rnan  must  realize  himself  not  independently 


NEW  CONCEPTIONS  OF  EDUCATION      427 

amid  nature,  as  Rousseau  had  said,  but  as  a  social  animal  in  coop- 
eration with  his  fellowmen.  Hence  he  made  his  schoolroom  a 
miniature  of  society,  a  place  where  courtesy  and  helpfulness  and 
social  cooperation  were  prominent  features.  This  social  and  at 
times  reverent  atmosphere  of  the  kindergarten  has  always  been  a 
marked  characteristic  of  its  work.  To  bring  out  social  ideas  many 
dramatic  games,  such  as  shoemaker,  carpenter,  smith,  and 
farmer,  were  devised  and  set  to  music.  The  "story"  by  the 
teacher  was  made  prominent,  and  this  was  retd[d  in  language, 
acted,  sung,  and  often  worked  out  constructively  in  clay,  blocks, 
or  paper.  Other  games  to  develop  skill  were  worked  out,  and 
use  was  made  of  sand,  clay,  paper,  cardboard,  and  color.  The 
"gifts"  and  "occupations"  which  Froebel  devised  were  intended 
to  develop  constructive  and  aesthetic  power,  and  to  provide  for 
connection  and  development  they  were  arranged  into  an  organ- 
ized series  of  playthings,  vjndividual  development  as  its  aim, 
motqr^e^ression  as  its  method,  and  social  cooperation  as  its 
means  were  the  characteristic  ideas  of  this  new  school  for  little 
children  (R.  358).") 

The  contribution  of  the  kindergarten.  Wholly  aside  from  the 
specific  training  given  children  during  the  year,  year  and  a  half, 
or  two  years  they  spend  in  this  type  of  school,  the  addition  of  the 
kindergarten  to  elementary-school  work  has  been  a  force  of  very 
large  significance  and  usefulness.  The  idea  that  the  child  is 
prijnarily  an  active  and  not  a  learning  animal  has  been  given  new 
emphasis,  andlEIiat  educatigji  comes  chiefly  by  doing  has  been 
given  new  force.  The  idea  that  a  child's  chief  business  is  p]ay  has 
been  a  new  conception  of  large  educational  vj,lue.  The  elimina- 
tion  of  book  education  and  harsh  discipline  in  the  kindergarten 
has  been  a!n" idealhatTias  slowly  but^gradually  been  extended  up- 
ward  into  the  lower  grg,desof  the  elementary  sdipoT. 

To-day,  largely  as  a  result  of  the  spreading  of  the  kindergarten 
spirit,  the  world  is  coming  to  recognize  play  and  games  at  some- 
thing like  their  real  social,  moral,  and  educational  values,  wholly 
aside  from  their  benefits  as  concern  physical  welfare,  and  in  many 
places  dire(;Aed  play  is  being  scheduled  as  a  regular  subject  in 
school  programs.  Music,  too,  has  attained  new  emphasis  since 
the  coming  of  the  kindergarten,  and  methods  of  teaching  music 
more  in  harrnony  with  kindergarten  ideas  have  been  introduced 
into  the  schools. 

Instruction  in  the  manual  activities.     Froebel  not  only  intro- 


428        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

duced  constructive  work  —  paper-folding,  weaving,  needlework, 
and  work  with  sajid  and  clay  and  color  —  into  the  kindergarten, 
but  he  also  proposed  to  extend  and  deyjelop  such  work  for  the  up- 
per years  of  schooling  in  a  school  for  hand  training  which  he  out- 
lined, but  did  not  establish.  His  proposed  plan  included  the  ele- 
ments of  the  so-called  manual-training  jdea,  developed  later,  and 
he  justified  such  instruction  on  the  same  educational  grounds 
that  we  advance  to-day.  It  was  not  to  teach  a  boy  a  trade,  as 
Rousseau  had  advocated,  or  to  train  children  in  sense-perception, 
as  Pestalozzi  had  employed  all  his  manual  activities,  but  as  a 
form  of  educational  expression,  and  for  the  purpose  of  developing 
creative  power  within  the  child.  The  idea  was  advocated  by  a 
number  of  thinkers,  about  1850  to  i860,  but  the  movement  took 
its  rise  in  Finland  (1866),  Sweden  (1872),  and  Russia. 

Spread  of  the  manual-training  idea.  France  was  the  first  of 
the  larger  European  nations  to  adopt  this  new  addition  to  ele- 
mentary-school instruction,  a  training-school  being  organized  at 
Paris  in  1873,  and,  in  1882,  the  instruction  in  manual  activities 
was  ordered  introduced  into  all  the  primary  schools  of  France. 
It  has  required  time,  though,  to  provide  workrooms  and  to  realize 
this  idea,  and  it  is  still  lacking  in  complete  accomplishment.  In 
England  the  work  was  first  introduced  in  London,  about  1887. 
The  government  at  once  accepted  the  idea,  encouraged  its  spread, 
and  began  to  aid  in  the  training  of  teachers.  By  1900  the  work 
was  found  in  all  the  larger  cities,  and  included  cooking  and  serving 
for  girls,  as  well  as  manual  work  for  boys.  The  training  for  girls 
goes  back  still  farther,  and  was  an  outgrowth  of  the  earlier 
"schools  of  industry"  established  to  train  girls  for  dornestic  serv- 
ice (R.  241).  By  1846  instruction  in  needlework  had  been  begun 
in  earnest  in  England.  In  German  lands  needlework  was  also 
an  early  school  subject,  while  some  domestic  training  for  girls 
had  been  provided  in  most  of  the  cities,  before  1914.  Manual 
training  for  boys,  though,  despite  much  propaganda  work,  had 
made  but  little  headway  up  to  that  time.  As  in  the  case  of  the 
kindergarten,  the  initiative  and  self-expression  aspects  of  the 
maflnal-training  movement  made  no  appeal  to  those  responsible 
for  the  work  of  the  people's  schools,  and,  in  consequence,  the 
manual  activities  have  in  German  lands  been  reserved  largely  for 
the  continuation  and  vocational  schools  for  older  pupils. 

In  the  United^States  the  manual-training  and  household-arts 
ideas  have  found  a  very  ready  welcome.    Curious  as  it  may  seem. 


NEW  CONCEPTIONS  OF  EDUCATION      429 

the  first  introduction  to  the  United  States  of  this  new  form  of  in- 
struction came  through  the  exhibit  made  by  the  Russian  goyieru- 
ment  at  the  Centennial  Exhibition  of  1876,.  showing  the  work  in 
wood  and  i^-on  made  by  the  pupils  at  the  Inaperial  Technical  In- 
stitute at  Moscow.  This,  however,  was  not  the  Swedish  sloyd, 
but  a  type  of  work  especially  adapted  to  secondary-school  in- 
struction. In  consequence  the  movement  for  instruction  in  the 
manual  activities  in  the  United  States,  unl^e  in  other  nations, 
began  (1880)  as  a  highly  organized  technical  type  of  high-school 
ii^struction,  while  the  elementary-school  sloyd  (1882)  and  the 
household  arts  (1885)  for  girls  came  in  later.  This  type  of  tech- 
nical high  school  has  since  developed  rapidly  in  this  country, 
has  rendered  an  important  educational  service,  and  is  a  pecul- 
iarly American  creation.  In  Europe  the  manual-training  idea  has 
been  confined  to  the  elementary  school,  and  no  institution  exists 
there  which  parallels  these  costly  and  well-equipped  American 
technical  secondary  schools. 

From  a  few  beginnings  in  eastern  cities  the  movement  spread, 
though  at  first  rather  slowly.  By  1900  approximately  forty  cities, 
nearly  all  of  them  in  the  Nprth  Atlantic  group  of  States,  had  in- 
troduced work  in  manual  training  and  the  household  arts  into 
their  elemeutary  schools,  but  since  that  time  the  work  has  been 
extended  to  practically  all  cities,  and  to  many  towns  and  rural 
communities  as  well. 

Contribution  of  the  manual-activities  idea.  These  new  forms 
of  school  work  were  at  first  advocated  on  the  grounds  of  formal 
discipline  —  that  they  trained  the  reasoning,  exercised  the  powers 
of  ohservation,  and  strengthened  the  will.  The  "exercises,"  true 
to  such  a  conception,  were  quite  formal  and  uniform  for  all. 
With  the  breakdown  of  the  "faculty  psychology,"  and  the 
abandonment  in  large  part  of  the  doctrine  of  formal  discipline  in 
the  training  of  the  mind,  the  whole  manual-training  and  house- 
hold-arts work  has  had  to  be  reshaped. 

To-day  the  instruction  given  in  manual  work  and  the  house- 
hold arts  in  all  their  forms  has  been  further  changed  to  make 
of  them  educational  instruments  for  interpreting -the  fields  of 
art  and  industry  and  home-life  in  terms  of  their  social  signifi- 
cance and  usefulness.  Through  these  two  new  forms  of  educa- 
tion, also,  the  pupils  in  the  elementary  schools^have  been  given 
training  in  expression  and  an  insight  into  the  practical  work  of 
life  impossible  in  the  old  textbook  type  of  elementary  sdbool.    In 


430       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

the  kindigrgarten,  manual  work,  and  the  household  arts,  yFroebel's 
principle  of  education  through  directed  self-activity  and  seifs. 
expression  has  born  abundant  fruit.  I 

In  the  hands  of  French,  English,  and  American  educators  the 
original  manuaJrarts  idea  has  been  greatly  expanded.  In  France 
some  form  of  expression  has  been  worked  out  for  all  grades  of  the 
primary  school,  and  the  work  has  been  closely  connected  with  art 
and  industry  on  the  one  hand  and  with  the  home-life  of  the  people 
on  the  other.  In  England  the  project  system  as  applied  to  indus- 
try, and  the  household  arts  with  reference  to  home-life,  have  been 
emphasized.  In  the  United  States  the  work  has  been  individual- 
ized perhaps  more  than  anywhere  else,  applied  in  many  new" di- 
rections —  clay,  leather,  cement,  metal  —  and  used  as  a  very 
important  instrument  for  self-expression  and  the  development  of 
individual  thinking. 

IV.  THE  ADDITION  OF  SCIENCE  STUDY 

The  gradual  extension  of  the  interest  in  science.  A  very  prom- 
inent feature  of  world  educational  development,  since  about  the 
middle  of  the  nineteenth  centujy,  has  been  the  general  introduc- 
tion into  the  schools  of  the  study  of  science..  It  is  no  exaggeration 
of  the  importance  of  this  to  say  that  no  addition  of  new  subject- 
matter  and  no  change  in  the  direction  and  purpose  of  education, 
since  that  time,  has  been  of  greater  importance  for  the  welfare  of 
mankind,  or  more  significant  of  new  world  conditions,  than  has 
been  the  emphasis  recently  placed,  in  all  divisions  of  state  school 
systen:is,  on  instruction  in  the  principles  and  the  applications  of 
science. 

The  great  early  development  of  scientific  study  had  been  car- 
ried on  in  a  few  universities  or  had  been  done  by  independent 
scholars,  and  had  but  little  influenced  instruction  in  the  colleges 
or  the  schools  below. 

Science  instruction  reaches  the  schools  but  slowly.  The  text- 
book organization  of  this  new  scientific  knowledge,  for  teaching 
purposes,  and  its  incorporation  into  the  instruction  of  the  schools^ 
took  place  but  slowly. 

I.  The  elementary  schools.  The  greatest  and  the  earliest  success 
was  made  in  German  lands.  There  the  pioneer  work  of  Basedow 
(p.  294)  and  the  Philanthropinists  had  awakened  a  widespread 
interest  in  scientific  studies.  In  Switzerland,  too,  Pestalozzi 
had  developed  elementary  science  study  and  home  geography, 


NEW  CONCEPTIONS  OF  EDUCATION      431 

and,  when  Pestalozzian  methods  were  introduced  into  the  schools 
of  Prussia,  the  study  of  elementary  science  (Realien)  soon  became 
a  feature  of  the  Volksschule  instruction.  From  Prussia  it  spread 
to  all  German  lands.  In  England  the  Pestalozzian  idea  was  in- 
troduced into  the  Infant  Schools,  though  in  a  very  formal  fash- 
ion, under  the  heading  of  object  lessons.  In  this  form  elementary 
science  study  reached  the  United  States,  about  i860,  though 
a  decade  later  well-organized  courses  in  elementary  science  in- 
struction began  to  be  introduced  into  the  American  elementary 
schools. 

2.  The  secondary  schools.  In  the  secondary  schools  the  earliest 
work  of  importance  in  introducing  the  new  scientific  subjects  was 
done  by  the  Germans  and  the  French.  In  German  lands  the 
Reals^imle  obtained  an  early  start  (1747),  and  the  new  instruc- 
tion in  mathematics  and  science  it  included  had  begun  to  be 
adopted  by  the  German  secondary  schools,  especially  in  the 
South  German  States,  before  the  period  of  reaction  set  in.  Dur- 
ing the  reign  of  Napoleon  the  scientific  course  in  the  French  Ly- 
cees  was  given  special  prominence.  After  about  181 5,  and  con- 
tinuing until  after  1848,  practical  and  thought-provoking  studies 
were  under  an  official  ban  in  both  countries,  and  classical  studies 
were  specially  favored.  Finally,  in  1852  in  France  and  in  1859 
in  Prussia,  responding  to  changed  political  conditions  and  new 
economic  demands,  both  the  scientific  course  in  the  Lycees  and 
the  Realschulen  were  given  ofiicial  recognition,  and  thereafter 
received  increasing  state  favor  and  support.  The  scientific  idea 
also  took  deep  root  in  Denmark.  There  the  secondary  schools 
were  modernized,  in  1809,  when  the  sciences  were  given  an  im- 
portant place,  and  again  in  1850,  when  many  of  the  Latin  schools 
were  transformed  into  Realskoler. 

In  the  United  States  the  academies  and  the  early  high  schools 
both  had  introduced  quite  an  amount  of  mathematics  and  book- 
science,  and,  after  about  1875,  the  development  of  laboratory  in- 
struction in  science  in  the  growing  high  schools  took  place  rather 
rapidly.  Fellenberg's  work  in  Switzerland  (p.  302)  had  also 
awakened  much  interest  in  the  United  States,  and  by  1830  a 
number  of  Schools  of  Industry  and  Science  had  begun  to  appear. 
These  made  instruction  in  mathematics  and  science  prominent 
features  of  their  work. 

The  challenge  of  Herbert  Spencer.  By  the  middle  of  the  nine- 
teenth century  the  scientific  and  industrial  revolutions  had  pro- 


432        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


duced  important  changes  in  the  conditions  of  living  in  all  the  then 
important  world  nations.  Particularly  in  the  German  States, 
France,  England,  and  the  United  States  had  the  effects  of  the 
revolutions  in  manufacturing  and  living  been  felt.  In  conse- 
quence there  had  been,  for  some  time,  a  growing  controversy  be- 
tween the  partisans  of  the  older  classical  training  and  the  newer 
scientific  studies  as  to  their  relatiyejworth  and  importance,  both 
fofmtellectual  discipline  and  as  preparation  for  intelligent  living, 
and  by  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century  this  had  become 
quite  sharp.  The  "facjilty  psychology,"  upon  which  the  theory 
of'the  discipline  of  the  powers  of  tHe  mind  by  the  classics  was 
largely  based,  was  attacked,  and  the  contention  was  advanced 
that  the  con_tent  of  studies  was  of  more  importance  in  education 
than  was  me^od  and  drill.  The  advocates  of  the  newer  studies 
contended  that  a  study  of  the  classics  no  longer  provided  a  suita- 
ble preparation  for  intelligent  living,  and  the  question  of  the  rela- 
•tive  worth  of  the  older  and  newer  studies  elicited  more  and  more 
discussion  as  the  century  advanced. 

In  1859  one  of  England's  greatest  scholars,  Herbert  Spencer, 
brought  the  whole  question  to  a  sharp  issue  by  the  publication  of 
a  remarkably  incisive  essay  on  "What  Knowledge  is  of  Most 
Worth?  "  In  this  he  declared  that  the  purpose  of  ediic^tion  was 
to  "prepare  us  for  complete  living,"  and  that  the  only  way  to 

judge  of  the  value  of  an  educational 
course  was  first  to  classify,  in  the 
order  of  their  importance,  the  lead- 
ing activities  and  needs  of  Hfe,  and 
then  measure  the  course  of  study 
by  how  fully  it  offers  such  a  prepa- 
ration. Doing  so  (R.  362),  and  ap- 
plying such  a  test,  he  concluded  that 
of  all  subjects  a  knowledge  of  science 
(R.  363)  "was  always  most  useful  for 
preparation  for  life,"  and  therefore 
the  type  of  knowledge  of  most  worth. 
In  three  other  essays  he  recom- 
mended a  complete  change  from  the 
classical  type  of  training  which  had 
dominated  English  seconda.ry  education  since  the  days  of  the 
Renaissance.  Still  more,  instead  of  a  few  being  educated  by  a 
"  culturaf  discipline  "  for  a  life  of  learning  and  leisure,  he  urged 


Fig.  99.  Herbert  Spencer 
(1820-1903) 


NEW  CONCEPTIONS  OF  EDUCATION      433 

general  instruction  in  science,  that  all  might  receive  training  and 
help  for  the^aily  duties  of  life. 

These  essays  attracted  wide  attention,  not  only  in  England  but 
in  many  other  lands  as  well.  They  were  a  statement,  in  clear  and 
forceful  English,  of  the  best  ideas  of  the  educational  reformers  for 
three  centuries.  In  his  statement  of  the  principles  upon  which 
sound  inteljectual  education  should  be  based  he  merely  enunci- 
ated theses  for  which  educational  reformers  had  stood  since  the 
days  of  Ratke  and  Comenius.  In  his  treatment  of  moral  and 
physical  education  he  voiced  the  best  ideas  of  John  Locke.  Spen- 
cer's great  service  was  in  giving  forceful  expression  to  ideas 
which,  by  i860,  had  become  current,  and  in  so  doing  he  pushed  to 
the  front  anew  the  question  of  educational  values.  The  scientific 
and  industrial  revolutions  had  prepared  the  way  for  a  redirection 
of  national  education,  and  the  time  was  ripe  in  England,  France, 
German  lands,  and  the  United  States  for  such  a  discussion.  As  a 
result,  though  the  questions  he  raised  are  still  in  part  unsettled,  a 
great  change  in  assigned  values  has  since  been  effected  not  only  in 
these  naiipns,  but  in  most  other  nations  and  lands  which  have 
drawn  the  inspiration  for  their  educational  systems  from  them. 
Though  his  work  was  not  specially  original,  we  must  nevertheless 
class  Herbert  Spencer  as  one  of  the  great  writers  on  educational 
aims  and  purpioses,  and  his  book  as  one  of  the  great  influences 
in  reshaping  educational  practice.  He  gave  a  new  emphasis 
to  the  work  of  all  who  had  preceded  him,  and  out  of  the  discus- 
sion which  ensued  came  a  new  and  a  greatly  enlarged  estimate 
as  to  the  impprtance  of  science  study  in  all  divisions  of  the 
school. 

The  new  educational  purpose.  It  is  perhaps  not  too  much  to 
say  that  out  of  Spencer'^  gathering-up  and  forceful  statement  of 
the  best  ideas  of  his  time,  and  the  discussion  which  followed,  a  new 
conception  of  the  educational  purpose  as  adjustment  to  the  life 
one  is  to  live  —  physical,  economic,  socia],  moral,  political  —  was 
clearly  formulated,  and  a  new  definition  of  a  lijieral  education  was 
framed. 

The  inter-relation  between  the  movement  for  the  study  of  the 
sciences  and  the  other  moyeiaents  for  the  improvement  of  in- 
struction which  we  have  so  far  described  in  this  chapter,  was 
close.  Pestalozzi  had  emphasized  instruction  in  geography  and 
the  study  of  nature;  Frqebel  had  given  a  prominent  place  to  na- 
ture studj;^  and  school  gardening;  the  manual-arts  work  tended  to 


434        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

exhibit  industrial  processes  and  relationships;  and  the  scientific 
emgliasis  on  cont.etit  rather  than  drill  was  in  harmony  with  the 
theories  of  all  the  modern  reformers.  Still  more,  the  scientific 
movement  was  in  close  harmony  with  the  new  individualistic 
tendency  of  the  early  part  of  the  nineteenth  century,  and  with  the 
movements  for  the  improvement  of  individual  and  national  wel- 
fare which  have  been  so  prominent  a  characteristic  of  the  latter 
half  of  the  century. 

V.  SOCIAL  MEANING  OF  THESE  CHANGES 

A  century  of  progress.  Pestalozzi,  true  to  the  individualistic 
spirit  of  the  age  in  which  he  lived  and  worked,  had  seen  education 
as  an  individual  development,  and  the  ends  of  education  as  in- 
dividual ends.  The  spirit  of  the  French  Revolutionary  period 
was  the  spirit  of  individualism.  With  the  progress  of  the  Indus- 
trial Revolution  and  the  consequent  rise  of  new  social  problems, 
the  emphasis  was  gradually  shifted  from  the  individual  to  society 
—  f  rorfTthe  smgle  man  to  the  man  in  the  mass!  The  first  educa- 
tional thinker  ol  importance  to  see  and  dearly  state  this  new  con- 
ception in  terms  of  the  school  was  Herbart.  Seeing  the  educa- 
tional purpose  in  far  clearer  perspective  than  had  those  who  had 
gone  before  him,  he  showed  that  education  must  have  for  its 
function  the  preparation  of  man  to  live  in  organized  society,  and 
that  character  and  social  morality,  rather  than  individual  devel- 
opment, must  in  consequence  be  the  larger  aims.  Froebel,  pos- 
sessed of  something  of  the  same  insight,  and  seeing  clearly  the 
educational  importance  of  activity  and  expression,  had  opened  up 
for  children  a  wealth  of  new  contacts  with  the  world  about  them 
in  the  new  type  of  educational  institution  which  he  created.  His 
principles,  he  said,  when  thoroughly  worked  out  and  applied  to 
education  ''would  revolutionize  the  world." 

Since  this  early  pioneer  work  changes  in  school  work  have  been 
numerous  and  of  far-reaching  importance.  The  methods  and 
purpose  of  instruction  in  the  older  subjects  have  been  revised; 
new  studies,  which  would  serve  to  interpret  to  the  young  the  in- 
dustrial and  social  revolutions  of  the  nineteenth  century,  have 
been  introduced;  the  expression-subjects  —  the  domestic  arts, 
music,  drawing,  clay-modeling,  color  work,  the  manual  arts,  na- 
ture study,  gardening  —  have  given  a  new  direction  to  school 
work;  and  the  study  of  science  and  the  vocations  has  attained  to  a 
place  of  importance  previously  unknown.     During  the  past  half' 


NEW  CONCEPTIONS  OF  EDUCATION      435 

century  the  school  has  been  transformed,  in  the  principal  world 
nations,  from  a  disciplinary  institution  where  drill  in  mastering 
the  rudiments  of  knowledge  was  given,  into  an  instrument  of  de- 
mocracy calculated  to  train  young  people  for  living,  for  useful 
service  in  the  office  and  shop  and  honie,  and  to  prepare  them  for 
intelligent  participation  in  the  increasingly  complex  social  and 
political  and  industrial  life  of  a  modem  world.  This  transforma- 
tion of  the  school  has  not  always  been  easy  (R.  365),  but  the 
vastly  changed  conditions  of  modem  life  have  demanded  such  a 
transformation  in  all  progressive  nations. 

The  contribution  of  John  Dewey.  The  foremost  American  in- 
terpreter, in  terms  of  the  school,  of  the  vast  social  and  industrial 
changes  which  have  marked  the  nineteenth  century,  is  John 
Dewey  (1859-  h^>^.  Better  perhaps  than  any  one  else  he  has 
thought  out  and  stated  a  new  educational  philosophy,  suited  to 
the  changed  and  changing  conditions  of  human  living.  His  work, 
both  experimental  and  theoretical,  has  tended  both  to  re-psy- 
chologize (R.  364)  and  socialize  education;  to  give  to  it  a  practical 
content,  along  scientific  and  industrial  lines;  and  to  interpret  to 
the  child  the  new  social  and  industrial  conditions  of  modern  soci- 
ety by  connecting  the  activities  of  the  school  closely  with  those  of 
real  life. 

Starting  with  the  premises  that  "the  school  cannot  be  a  prepa- 
ration for  social  life  except  as  it  reproduces  the  typical  conditions 
of  social  life  ";  that  "industrial  activities  are  the  most  influential 
factors  in  -determining  the  thought,  the  ideals,  and  the  social  or- 
ganization of  a  people  ";  and  that  "the  school  should  be  life,  not  a 
preparation  for  living";  Dewey  for  a  time  conducted  an  experi- 
mental school,  for  children  from  four  to  thirteen  years  of  age,  to 
give  concrete  expression  to  his  educational  ideas.  These,  first 
consciously  set  forth  by  Froebel,  were: 

1.  That  the  primary  business  of  the  school  is  to  train  in  cooperative 
and  mutually  helpful  living.  .  .  . 

2.  That  the  primary  root  of  all  educational  activity  is  in  the  in- 
stinctive, impulsive  attitudes  and  activities  of  the  child,  and  not 
in  the  presentation  and  application  of  external  material. 

3.  That  these  individual  tendencies  and  activities  are  organized  and 
directed  through  the  uses  made  of  them  in  keeping  up  the  cooper- 
ative living  .  .  .  taking  advantage  of  them  to  reproduce,  on  the 
child's  plane,  the  typical  doings  and  occupations  of  the  larger, 
maturer  society  into  which  he  is  finally  to  go  forth;  and  that  it  is 
through  production  and  creative  use  that  valuable  knowledge  is 
clinched. 


436       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

The  work  of  this  school  was  of  fundamental  importance  in  di- 
recting the  reorganization  of  the  work  of  the  kindergarten  along 
different  and  larger  lines,  and  also  has  been  of  significance  in  re- 
directing the  instruction  in  both  the  social  subjects  —  history 
(R.  366),  literature,  etc.  —  and  the  manual,  domestic,  and  artis- 
tic activities  of  the  school.  In  his  subsequent  writings  he  may  be 
said  to  have  stated  an  important  new  philosophy  for  the  school  in 
terms  of  modern  social,  political,  and  industrial  needs. 

The  Dewey  educational  philosophy.  Believing  that  the  public 
school  is  the  chief  remedy  for  the  ills  of  organized  society,  Pro- 
fessor Dewey  has  tried  to  show  how  to  change  the  work  of  the 
school  so  as  to  make  it  a  miniature  of  society  itself.  Social  effi- 
dency,  and  not  mere  knowledge,  he  has  conceived  to  be'theend, 
and  this  social_efficiency  is  to  be  produced  through  participation 
in  the  activities  of  an  institution  of  society,  the  school.  The  dif- 
ferent parts  of  the  school  system  thus  become  a  unified  institu- 
tion, in  which  children  are  taught  how  to  live  amid  the  con- 
stantly increasing  complexities  of  modern  social  and  industrial 
life. 

Education,  therefore,  in  Dewey's  conception,  involves  not 
merely  learning,  but  pjay,  construction,  use  of  tools,  contact  with 
nature,  expression,  and  activity;  and  the  school  should  be  a  place 
where  children  are  working  rather  than  listening,  learning  life  by 
living  life,  and  becoming  acquainted  with  social  institutions  and 
industrial  processes  by  studying  them.  The  work  of  the  school 
is  in  large  part  to  reduce  the  complexity  of  modern  life  to  such 
terms  as  children  can  understand,  and  to  introduce  the  child  to 
modern  life  through  simplified  experiences.  Its  primary  business 
may  be  said  to  be  to  train  children  in  cooperative  and  mutually 
helpful  living.  The  virtues  of  a  school,  as  Dewey  points  out,  are 
learning  by  doing;  the  use  of  muscles,  sight  and  feeling,  as  well  as 
hearing;  and  the  employment  of  energy,  originality,  and  initia- 
tive. The  virtues  of  the  school  in  the  past  were  the  colorless, 
negative  virtues  of  obedience,  docility,  and  submission.  Mere 
obedience  and  the  careful  performance  of  imposed  tasks  he  holds 
to  be  not  only  a  poor  preparation  for  social  and  industrial  effi- 
ciency, but  a  poor  preparation  for  democratic  so^ety  and  govern- 
ment as  well.  Responsibility  for  good  government,  under  any 
democratic  form  of  organization,  rests  with  all,  and  the  school 
should  prepare  for  the  political  life  of  to-morrow  by  training  its 
pupils  to  meet  responsibilities,  developing  initiative,  awakening 


NEW  CONCEPTIONS  OF  EDUCATION      437 

social  insight,  and  causing  each  to  shoulder  a  fair  share  of  the 
work  of  government  in  the  school. 

We  have  now  before  us  the  great  contributions  to  a  philosophy 
for  the  educational  process  made  since  the  beginning  of  the  nine- 
teenth century.  Many  other  workers  in  different  lands,  but 
more  particularly  in  German  lands,  France,  Italy,  England,  and 
the  United  States,  have  added  their  labors  to  the  expansion  and  re- 
direction of  the  school.  They  are  too  numerous  to  mention  and, 
though  often  nationally  important,  need  not  be  included  here. 
Still  more,  the  contributions  of  Pestalozzi,  Herbart,  Froebel, 
Spencer,  Dewey,  and  their  followers  and  disciples  are  so  inter- 
woven in  the  educational  theory  and  practice  of  to-day  that  it  is 
in  most  cases  impossible  to  separate  them  from  one  another. 


QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

1.  How  do  you  explain  the  long-continued  objection  to  teacher-training? 

2.  Contrast  "oral  and  objective  teaching"  with  the  former  "individual  in- 
struction." 

3.  Show  how  complete  a  change  in  classroom  procedure  this  involved. 

4.  Show  how  Pestalozzian  ideas  necessitated  a  "  technique  of  instruction. 

5.  Why  is  it  that  Pestalozzian  ideas  as  to  language  and  arithmetic  instruc- 
tion have  so  slowly  influenced  the  teaching  of  grammar,  language,  and 
arithmetic? 

6.  How  do  you  explain  the  decline  in  importance  of  the  once-popular  mental 
arithmetic? 

7.  Show  how  child  study  was  a  natural  development  from  the  Pestalozzian 
psychology  and  methodology. 

8.  Explain  what  is  meant  by  the  statements  that  Herbart  rejected: 

(a)  The  conventional-social  ideal  of  Locke.  . 

(b)  The  unsocial  ideal  of  Rousseau. 

(c)  The  "faculty-psychology"  conception  of  Pestalozzi. 

9.  Explain  what  is  meant  by  saying  that  Herbart  conceived  of  education  as 
broadly  social,  rather  than  personal. 

10.  Show  in  what  ways  and  to  what  extent  Herbart: 

(a)  Enlarged  our  conception  of  the  educational  process. 

(b)  Improved  the  instruction  content  and  process. 

u.  Explain  why  Herbartian  ideas  took  so  much  more  quickly  in  the  United 
States  than  did  Pestalozzianism. 

12.  State  the  essentials  of  the  kindergarten  idea,  and  the  psychology  behind 
it. 

13.  State  the  contribution  of  the  kindergarten  idea  to  education. 

14.  Show  the  connection  between  the  sense  impression  ideas  of  Pestalozzi, 
the  self-activity  of  Froebel,  and  the  manual  activities  of  the  modern  ele- 
mentary school. 

15.  Explain  why  scientific  studies  came  into  the  schools  so  slowly,  up  to 
about  i860,  and  so  very  rapidly  after  about  that  time. 

16.  State  the  comparative  importance  of  content  and  drill  in  education. 


438        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

17.  Does  the  reasoning  of  Herbert  Spencer  appeal  to  you  as  sound?    If  not, 
why  not? 

18.  Show  how  the  argument  of  Spencer  for  the  study  of  science  was  also  an 
argument  for  a  more  general  diffusion  of  educational  advantages. 

19.  Would  schools  have  advanced  in  importance  as  they  have  done  had  the 
industrial  revolution  not  taken  place?    Why? 

20.  Why  is  more  extended  education  called  for  as  "industrial  life  becomes 
more  diversified,  its  parts  narrower,  and  its  processes  more  concealed"? 

21.  Point  out  the  social  significance  of  the  educational  work  of  John  Dewey. 

22.  Point  out  the  value,  in  the  new  order  of  society,  of  each  group  of  school 
subjects  listed  in  footnote  i  on  page  415. 

23.  Contrast  the  virtues  of  a  school  before  Pestalozzi's  time  and  those  of  a 
modern  school.  : 

SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  selections  illustrative 
of  the  contents  of  this  chapter  are  reproduced: 

344.  Bache:  The  German  Seminaries  for  Teachers. 

345.  Bache:  A  German  Teachers'  Seminary  Described. 

346.  Bache:  A  French  Normal  School  Described. 

347.  Barnard:  Beginnings  of  Teacher-Training  in  England. 

348.  Barnard:  The  Pupil-Teacher  System  Described. 

349.  Clinton:  Recommendation  for  Teacher-Training  Schools. 

350.  Massachusetts:  Organizing  the  First  Normal  Schools. 

(c)  The  Organizing  Law. 

{b)  Admission  and  Instruction  in. 

(c)  Mann:  Importance  of  the  Normal  School. 

351.  Early  Textbooks:  Examples  of  Instruction  from 

(o)  Davenport:  History  of  the  United  States. 
{b)  Morse:  Elements  of  Geography — Map. 
(c)  Morse:  Elements  of  Geography. 

352.  Murray:  A  Typical  Teacher's  Contract. 

353.  Bache:  The  Elementary  Schools  of  Berhn  in  1838. 

354.  Providence:  Grading  the  Schools  of. 

355.  Felkin:  Herbart's  Educational  Ideas. 

356.  Felkin:  Herbart's  Educational  Ideas  Applied. 

357.  Titchener:  Herbart  and  Modern  Psychology. 

358.  Marenholtz-Bulow:  Froebel's  Educational  Views. 

359.  Huxley:  English  and  German  Universities  Contrasted. 

360.  Huxley:  Mid-nineteenth-Century  Elementary  Education  in  Eng- 

land. 

361.  Huxley:  Mid-nineteenth-Century  Secondary  Education  in  England. 

362.  Spencer:  What  Knowledge  is  of  Most  Worth? 

363.  Spencer:  Conclusions  as  to  the  Importance  of  Science. 

364.  Dewey:  The  Old  and  New  Psychology  Contrasted. 

365.  Ping:  Difficulties  in  Transforming  the  School. 

(a)  Relating  Education  to  Life. 

{b)  The  Old  Teacher  and  the  New  System. 

366.  Dewey:  Socialization  of  School  Work  illustrated  by  History. 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

Barnard,  Henry.    National  Education  in  Europe. 
*Bowen,  H.  C.    Froebel  and  Education  through  Self-Activity, 


NEW  CONCEPTIONS  OF  EDUCATION      439 

Compayre,  G.     Herbert  and  Education  by  Instruction. 
*De  Garmo,  Chas.     Herbart  and  the  Herbartians. 
Dewey,  John.     The  School  and  Social  Progress.     (Nine  numbers.) 
*Dewey,  John.     The  School  and  Society. 
Gordy,  J.  P.     Rise  and  Growth  of  the  Normal  School  Idea  in  the  United 
States.     Circular  of  Information,  United  States  Bureau  of  Education, 
No.  8,  1891. 
Hollis,  A.  P.     The  Oswego  Movement. 
*Jordan,  D.  S.   "  Spencer's  Essay  on  Education";  in  Cosmopolitan  Maga- 
zine, vol.  xxix,  pp.  135-49.     (Sept.  1902.) 
Judd,  C.  H.     The  Training  of  Teachers  in  England,  Scotland,  and  Ger- 
many.    (Bulletin  35,  1914,  United  States  Bureau  of  Education.) 
Monroe,  Will  S.     History  of  the  Pestalozzian  Movement  in  the  United 
States. 
*Farker,  S.  C.    History  of  Modern  Elementary  Education. 
Ping  Wen  Kuo.     The  Chinese  System  of  Public  Education. 
Spencer,  Herbert.    Education;  Intellectual,  Moral,  and  Physical. 
VanderwaUter,  N.  C.     The  Kindergarten  in  American  Education. 


CHAPTER  XXIX 
NEW  TENDENCIES  AND  EXPANSIONS 

I.  POLITICAL 

The  enlarged  conception  of  public  education.    The  new  ideas  as 
to  the  purpose  and  functions  of  the  State_promulgated  by  Eng- 
lish and  French  eighteenth-century  thinkers,  and  given  concrete- 
expression  in  the  Anierican  and  French  revolutions  near  the  close 
of  the  century,  imparted,  as  we  have  seen,  a  new  meaning  to  the ' 
school  and  a  new  purpose  to  the  education  of  a  people.     In  the  x" 
theoretical  discussion  of  education  by  Rousseau  and  the  empirj- -T 
cal  work  of  Pestalozzi  a  new  individualistic  theory  for  a  secular 
school  was  created,  and  this  Prussia,  for  long  moving  in  that  di- 
rection, first  adopted  as  a  basis  for  the  state  school  system  it  early 
organized  to  serve  national  ends.     The  new  American  States, 
also  long  moving  toward  state  organization  and  control,  early 
created  state  schools  to  replace  the  earlier  religious  schools ;  while 
the  French  Revolution  enthusiasts  abolished  the  religious  school 
and  ordered  the  substitution  of  a  general  system  of  state  schools 
to  serve  their  national  ends. 

From  these  beginnings,  as  we  have  seen,  the  state-3chool  idea 
has  in  course  of  time  spread  to  all  continents,  and  nations  every- 
where to-day  have  come  to  feel  that  the  maintenance  of  a  more  or 
less  comprehensive  system  of  state  schools  is  so  closely  connected 
with  national  welfare  and  progress  as  to  be  a  necessity  for  the 
State  (R.  367).  In  consequence,  state  ministries  for  education 
have  been  created  in  all  the  important  world  nations;  st^ite  and 
local  school  officials  have  been  provided  generally  to  see  that  the 
state  purpose  in  creating  schools  is  carried  out;  state  normal 
schools  for  the  preparation  of  teachers  have  been  established; 
comprehensive  state  school  codes  have  been  enacted  or  educa- 
tional decrees  formulated;  and  constantly  increasing  expendi- 
tures for  education  are  to-day  derived  by  taxing  the  wealth  of  the 
State  to  educate  the  children  of  the  State. 

Change  from  the  original  purpose.  The  original  purpose  in  the 
establishment  of  schools  by  the  State  was  everywhere  to  pro- 
mote literacy  and  citizenship.  Under  all  democratic  forms  of 
government  it  was  also  to  insure  to  the  people  the  elements  of 


NEW  TENDENCIES  AND  EXPANSIONS     441 

learning  that  they  might  be  prepared  for  participation  in  the 
functions  of  government.  This  is  well  expressed  in  the  quota- 
tions given  (p.  287)  from  early  American  statesmen  as  to  the  need 
for  the  education  of  public  opinion  and  the  diffusion  of  knowledge 
among  the  people.  The  same  ideas  were  expressed  by  French 
writers  and  statesmen  of  the  time,  and  by  the  English  after  the 
passage  of  the  Reform  Bills  of  1832  and  1867  (p.  347).  With  the 
gradual  extension  of  the  franchise  to  larger  and  larger  numbers  of 
the  people,  the  extension  of  educational  advantages  naturally  had 
to  follow.  The  education  of  new  citizens  for  "  their  political  and 
civil  duties  as  members  of  society  and  freemen ''  became  a  neces- 
sity, and  closely  followed  each  extension  of  the  right  to  vote.  In 
all  democratic  governments  the  growing  complexity  of  modem 
political  society  has  since  greatly  enlarged  these  early  duties  of 
the  school.  To-day,  in  modem  nations  where  general  manhood 
suffrage  has  come  to  be  the  rule,  and  still  more  so  in  nations 
which  have  added  female  suffrage  as  well,  the  continually  in- 
creasing complexity  of  the  political,  economic,  and  social  prob- 
lems upon  which  the  voters  are  expected  to  pass  judgment  is  such 
that  a  more  prolonged  period  of  citizenship  education  is  necessary 
if  voters  are  to  exerdse,  in  any  intelligent  manner,  their  functions 
of  citizenship.  In  nations  where  the  initiative,  referendum,  and 
recall  have  been  added,  the  need  for  special  education  along  po- 
litical,  economic,  and  social  lines  has  been  still  further  empha- 
sized. 

At  first  instmction  in  the  common-school  branches,  with  in- 
stmction  in  morals  or  religion  added,  was  regarded  as  sufficient. 
In  States,  such  as  the  German,  where  religious  instruction  was  re- 
tained in  the  schools,  this  has  been  made  a  powerful  instrument 
in  moulding  the  citizenship  and  upholding  the  established  order. 
The  history  of  the  different  nations  has  also  been  used  by  each  as 
a  means  for  instilling  desired  conceptions  of  citizenship,  and  some 
work  in  more  or  less  formal  civil  government  has  usually  been 
added.  To-day  all  these  means  have  been  proven  inadequate  for 
democratic  peoples.  In  consequence,  the  work  in  civil  govern- 
ment is  being  changed  and  broadened  into  institutional  and  com- 
munity civics;  the  work  of  the  elernentary  school  is  being  social- 
ized, along  the  lines  advocated  by  Dewey;  and  instmction  in 
economic  principles  and  in  the  functions  of  government  is  being 
introduced  into  the  secondary  schools.  Instead  of  being  made 
mere  teaching  institutions,  engaged  in  promoting  literacy  and 


442       A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

diffusing  the  rudiments  of  learning  among  the  electorate,  schools 
are  to-day  being  called  upon  to  grasp  the  significance  of  their 
political  and  social  relationships,  and  to  transform  themselves 
into  institutions  for  improving  and  advancing  the  welfare  of  the 
State  (R.  368). 

The  promotion  of  nationality.  In  Prussia  the  promotion  of  na- 
tional solidarity  was  early  made  an  important  aim  of  the  school. 
This  has  in  time  become  a  common  national  purpose,  as  there  has 
dawned  upon  statesmen  generally  the  idea  that  a  national  spirit 
or  culture  is  "an  artificial  product  which  transcends  social,  reli- 
gious, and  economic  distinctions,"  and  that  it  "could  be  manu- 
factured by  education"  (R.  340).  In  consequence  of  this  dis- 
covery the  school  has  been  raised  to  a  new  position  of  importance 
in  the  national  life,  and  has  become  the  chief  means  for  develop- 
ing in  the  citizenship  that  national  unity  and  national  strength  so 
desirable  under  present-day  world  conditions.  In  the  German 
States,  where  this  function  of  the  school  has  in  recent  times  been 
perverted  to  carry  forward  imperialistic  national  ends  (R.  342) ;  in 
France,  where  it  has  been  intelligently  used  to  promote  a  rational 
type  of  national  strength  (R.  341) ;  in  Italy,  where  divergent  ra- 
cial types  are  being  fused  into  a  new  national  unity;  in  Cuba, 
Porto  Rico,  and  the  Philippines  (R.  343)  where  the  United  States 
has  used  education  to  bring  backward  peoples  up  to  a  new  level 
of  culture,  and  to  develop  in  them  firm  foundations  of  national 
solidarity;  in  China  (R.  335)  where  an  ancient  people,  speaking 
numerous  dialects,  is  making  the  difiicult  transition  from  an  old 
culture  to  the  newer  western  civilization;  and  in  Algiers  and  Mo- 
rocco, where  the  spirit  of  French  nationality  is  being  fused  into 
dark-skinned  tribesmen  —  everywhere  to-day,  where  public  edu- 
cation has  really  taken  hold  on  the  national  life,  we  find  the  schaol 
being  used  for  the  promotion  of  national  solidarity  and  the  incul- 
cation of  national  ideals  and  national  culture.  To  such  an  extent 
has  this  become  true  that  practically  all  the  pressing  problems 
of  the  school  to-day,  in  any  land,  find  their  ultimate  explanation 
in  terms  of  the  new  nineteenth-century  conceptions  of  political 
nationality. 

Since  the  development  of  world  trade  routes  following  long  rail 
and  steamship  lines,  along  which  people  as  well  as  raw  materials 
and  manufactured  articles  pass  to  and  fro,  the  entrance  of  new  and 
diverse  peoples  into  distant  national  groups  has  created  a  new 
problem  of  nationalization  that  before  the  early  nineteenth  cen- 


NEW  TENDENCIES  AND  EXPANSIONS    443 

tury  was  largely  unknown.  Previous  to  the  nineteenth  century 
the  problem  was  confined  almost  entirely  to  peoples  conquered 
and  annexed  by  the  fortunes  of  war.  To-day  it  is  a  voluntary 
migration  of  peoples,  and  a  migration  of  such  proportions  and 
from  such  distant  and  unlike  civilizations  that  the  problem  of  as- 
siniilating  the  foreigner  has  become,  particularly  in  the  English- 
speaking  nations  and  colonies,  to  which  distant  and  unrelated 
peoples  have^ turned  in  largest  numbers,  a  serious  national  prob- 
lem. The  migration  of  3^^,102,671  persons  to  the  United  States, 
between  1820  and  1914,  from  all  parts  of  the  world,  has  been  a 
movement  of  peoples  compared  with  which  the  migrations  of  the 
Germanic  tribes  —  Angles,  Saxons,  Jutes,  Goths,  Visigoths,  Van- 
dals, Suevi,  Danes,  Burgundians,  Huns  —  into  the  old  Roman 
Empire  in  the  fourth  and  fifth  centuries  pale  into  insignificance. 
No  such  great  movement  of  peoples  was  ever  known  before  in  his- 
tory, and  the  assimilative  power  of  the  American  nation  has  not 
been  equal  to  the  task.  The  World  War  revealed  the  extent  of 
the  failure  to  nationalize  the  foreigner  who  has  been  permitted 
to  come,  and  brought  the  question  of  "Americanization"  to  the^ 
front  as  one  of  the  most  pressing  problems  connected  with  Ameri- 
can national  education.  With  the  world  in  flux  racially  as  it  now 
is,  the  problem  of  the  assimilation  of  non-native  peoples  is  one 
which  the  schools  of  every  nation  which  offers  political  and  eco- 
nomic opportunity  to  other  peoples  must  face.  This  has  called 
for  the  organization  of  speiial  classes  in  the  schools,  evening  and 
adult  instruction,  community-center  work,  nationalization  pro- 
grams, compulsory  attendance  of  children,  state  oversight  of 
private  and  religious  schools,  and  other  forms  of  educational  un- 
dertakings undreamed  of  in  the  days  when  the  State  first  took 
over  the  schools  from  the  Church  the  better  to  promote  literacy 
and  citizenship. 

Effects  of  the  Industrial  Revolution.  The  effects  of  the  great 
industrial  and  social  changes  which  we  have  previously  described 
are  written  large  across  the  work  of  the  school.  As  the  civiliza- 
tion in  the  leading  world  nations  has  increased  in  complexity,  and 
the  ramifications  of  the  social  and  industrial  life  have  widened, 
the  school  has  been  called  upon  to  broaden  its  work,  and  develop 
new  types  of  instruction  to  increase  its  effectiveness.  An  educa- 
tion which  was  entirely  satisfactory  for  the  simpler  form  of  social 
and  industrial  life  of  two  generations  ago  has  been  seen  to  be  ut- 
terly inadequate  for  the  needs  of  the  present  and  the  future.    It 


444        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

is  the  far-reaching  change  in  social  and  industrial  and  home  life, 
brought  about  by  the  Industrial  Revolution,  which  underlies  most 
of  the  pressing  problems  in  educational  readjustment  to-day.  With 
the  ever-increasing  subdivisipn  and  specialization  of  labor,  the 
danger  from  jclass  subdivision  has  constantly  increased,  and  more 
and  more  the  school  has  been  called  upon  to  instill  into  all  a  po- 
litical and  social  consciousness  that  will  lead  to  unity  amid  in- 
creasing diversity,  and  to  concerted  action  for  the  preservation/ 
and  improvement  of  the  national  life.  \ 

More  education  than  formerly  has  also  been  demanded  to  en- 
able future  citizens  to  meet  intelligently  national  and  personal 
problems,  and  with  the  widening  of  the  suffrage  and  the  spread  of 
democratic  ideas  there  has  come  a  necessary  widening  of  the  edu- 
cational ladder,  so  that  more  of  the  masses  of  the  people  may 
climb.  Even  in  nations  having  the  continental-European  two- 
class  school  system,  larger  educational  opportunities  for  the 
masses  have  had  to  be  provided.  In  the  more  advanced  and  more 
democratic  nations  we  also  note  the  establishment  of  systems  of 
evening  schools,  adult  instruction,  university  extension,  science 
and  art  instruction  in  special  centers,  the  multiplication  of  libra- 
ries, and  the  increasing  use  of  the  lecture,  the  stereopticon,  and  the 
public  press,  for  the  purpose  of  keeping  the  people  informed.  No 
nation  has  done  more  to  extend  the  advantages  of  secondary  edu- 
cation to  its  people  than  has  the  United  States;  France  has  been 
especially  prominent  in  adult  instruction;  England  has  done  note- 
worthy work  with  university  extension  and  science  and  art  instruc- 
tion; while  the  United  States  has  carried  the  library  movement 
fa^-ther  than  any  other  land.  All  these,  again,  are  extensions  of 
educational  opportunity  to  the  masses  of  the  people  in  a  maimer 
undrearned  of  a  century  ago. 

University  expansion.  Within  the  past  three  quarters  of  a  cen- 
tury, and  in  many  nations  within  a  much  shorter  period  of  time,  the 
university  has  experienced  a  new  manifestation  of  popular  favor, 
and  is  to-day  looked  upon  as  perhaps  the  most  important  part, 
viewed  from  the  standpoint  of  the  future  welfare  of  the  State,  of 
the  entire  system  of  public  instruction  maintained  by  the  State. 
In  it  the  leaders  for  the  State  are  trained;  in  it  the  thinking  which 
is  to  dominate  government  a  quarter-century  later  is  largely  done ; 
out  of  it  come  the  creative  geniuses  whose  work,  in  dozens  of 
fields  of  human  endeavor,  will  mould  the  political,  social,  and  sci- 
entific future  of  the  nation  (R.  369).     Every  government  depend- 


NEW  TENDENCIES  AND  EXPANSIONS    445 

ing  upon  a  two-class  school  system  must  of  necessity  draw  its 
leaders  in  the  professions,  in  government,  in  pure  and  applied  sci- 
ence, and  in  many  other  lines  from  the  small  but  carefully  se- 
lected classes  its  imiversities  train.  In  a  democracy,  depending 
entirely  upon  drawing  its  future  leaders  from  among  the  mass, 
the  university  becomes  an  indispensable  institution  for  the  train- 
ing of  leaders  and  for  the  promotion  of  the  national  welfare.  In  a 
democratic  government  one  of  the  highest  functions  of  a  univer- 
sity is  to  educate  leaders  and  to  create  the  standards  for  democ- 
racy. 

The  university  has,  accordingly,  in  all  lands,  recently  experi- 
enced a  great  expansion,  and  in  no  country  has  the  development 
been  more  rapid  than  in  the  United  States  and  Canada.  New 
and  important  state  universities  are  to-day  found  in  most  of  the 
American  States  and  Canadian  Provinces,  some  States  maintain- 
ing two.  These  have  been  relatively  recent  creations  to  serve 
democracy's  needs,  and  upon  the  support  of  these  state  universi- 
ties large  and  increasing  sums  of  money  are  spent  annually.  In 
no  nation  of  the  world,  too,  has  private  benevolence  created  and 
endowed  so  many  private  universities  of  high  rank  as  in  the 
United  States,  and  these  have  fallen  into  their  proper  places  as 
auxiliary  agents  for  the  promotion  of  the  national  welfare  in  gov- 
ernment, science,  art,  and  the  learned  professions.  The  univer- 
sity development  since  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century  has 
been  greater  than  at  any  p)eriod  before  in  world  history,  and  with 
the  spread  of  democracy,  dependent  as  democracy  is  upon  mass 
educa,tion  to  obtain  its  leaders,  the  university  has  become  "the 
soiJ  of  the  State"  (R.  369).  The  university  development  of  the 
next  half-century,  the  world  as  a  whole  considered,  may  possibly 
surpass  anything  that  we  have  recently  witnessed. 

^he  state  school  systems  as  organized.  We  now  find  state 
school  systems  organized  in  all  the  leading  world  nations.  In 
many  the  system  of  public  instruction  maintained  is  broad  and 
extensive,  beginning  often  with  injant  schools  or  kindergartens, 
continuing  up  through  elementary  schools,  middle  schools,  con- 
tinuation schools,  secondary  schools,  and  normal  schools,  and  cul- 
minating in  one  or  more  state  universities.  In  addition  there  are 
to-day,  in  many  nations,  state  systems  of  scientific  and  technical 
schools  and  institutions,  and  vocational  schools  and  schools  for 
special  classes,  to  which  we  shall  refer  more  in  detail  a  little  fur- 
ther on.     The  support  of  all  these  systems  of  public  instruction 


446        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

to-day  comes  largely  from  the  direct  or  indirect  taxation  of  the 
wealth  of  the  State.  Being  now  conceived  of  as  essential  to  the 
welfare  and  progress  of  the  State,  the  State  yearly  confiscates  a 
portion  of  every  man's  property  and  uses  it  to  maintain  a  service 
deemed  vital  to  its  purposes.  The  sums  spent  to-day  on  educa- 
tion by  modern  States  seem  enormous,  compared  with  the  sums 
spent  for  education  under  conditions  existing  a  century  ago. 
The  rapidly  increasing  expenditures  merely  record  the  changing 
political  conception  as  to  the  national  importance  of  enlarging 
the  educational  opportunities  and  advantages  of  those  who  are 
to  constitute  and  direct  the  future  State. 

II,  SOCIOLOGICAL 

A  new  estimate  as  to  the  value  of  child  life.     As  we  saw  in 

chapter  xviii,  which  described  the  opportunities  for  and  the  kind 
of  schooling  developed  up  to  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century, 
but  little  of  what  may  be  called  formal  education  had  been  pro- 
vided up  to  then  for  the  great  mass  of  children,  even  in  the  most 
progressive  nations.  We  also  noted  the  extreme  brutality  of  the 
school.  Such  was  the  history  of  childhood,  so  far  as  it  may  be  said 
to  have  had  a  history  at  all,  up  to  the  rise  of  the  great  humanita- 
rian movement  early  in  the  nineteenth  century.  N^lect,  abuse, 
mutilation,  excessive  labor,  heavy  punishments,  and  often  virtual 
slavery  awaited  children  everywhere  up  to  recent  times.  The 
sufferings  of  childhood  at  home  were  added  to  by  others  in  the 
school  (p.  244)  for  such  as  frequented  these  institutions. 

Since  about  1850  an  entirely  new  estimate  has  come  to  be  placed 
on  the  importance  of  national  attention  to  child  welfare,  though 
the  beginnings  of  the  change  date  back  much  earlier.  As  we  have 
seen  (p.  240),  England  early  began  to  care  for  the  children  of  its 
poor.  In  the  Poor-Relief  and  Apprenticeship  Law  of  1601  (R. 
174)  England  organized  into  law  the  growing  practice  of  a  cen- 
tury and  laid  the  basis  for  much  future  work  of  importance. 
In  this  legislation,  as  we  have  seen,  the  foundations  of  the  Massa- 
chusetts school  law  of  1642  were  laid.  In  the  Virginia  laws  of 
1643  and  1646  (R.  200  a)  and  the  Massachusetts  law  of  1660,  pro- 
viding for  the  apprenticeship  of  orphans  and  homeless  children, 
the  beginnings  of  child-welfare  work  in  the  American  Colonies 
were  made. 

Many  of  the  Catholic  religious  orders  in  Europe  had  for  long 
cared  for  and  brought  up  poor  and  neglected  children,  and  in  1 729 


NEW  TENDENCIES  AND  EXPANSIONS     447 

the  first  private  orphanage  in  the  new  world  was  established  by 
the  Ursuline  Order  in  New  Orleans.  The  first  public  orphan- 
age in  America  was  established  in  Charleston,  South  Carolina, 
in  1790;  the  first  in  England  at  Birmingham,  in  1817 ;  and  in  1824 
the  New  York  House  of  Refuge  was  founded.  The  latter  was  the 
forerunner  of  the  juvenile  reformatory  institutions  established 
later  by  practically  all  of  the  American  States.  These  have  de- 
veloped chiefly  since  1850.  To-day  most  of  the  American  States 
and  governments  in  many  other  lands  also  provide  state  homes 
for  orphan  and  neglected  children,  where  they  are  clothed,  fed, 
cared  for,  educated,  and  trained  for  some  useful  employment. 

Child-labor  legislation.  One  of  the  best  evidences  of  the  new 
nineteenthncentury  humanitaiianism  is  to  be  found  in  the  large 
amount  of  child-labor  legislation  which  arose,  largely  after  1850, 
and  which  has  been  particularly  prominent  since  1900. 

Under  the  earlier  agricultural  conditions  and  the  restricted  de- 
mand for  education  for  ordinary  life  needs,  child  labor  was  not 
especially  harmful,  as  most  of  it  was  out  of  doors  and  under  rea- 
sonably good  health  conditions.  With  the  coming  of  the  factory 
system,  the  rise  of  cities  and  the  city  congestion  of  population, 
and  other  evils  connected  with  the  Industrial  Revolution,  the  whole 
situation  was  changed.  Humanitarians  now  began  to  demand 
legislation  to  restrict  the  evils  that  had  arisen.  This  demand 
arose  earliest  in  England,  and  resulted  in  the  earliest  legislation 
there. 

The  year  1802  is  important  in  the  history  of  child-welfare  work 
for  the  enactment,  by  the  English  Parliament,  of  the  first  law  to 
regulate  the  employment  of  chUdiren  in  factories.  This  was 
known  as  the  Health  and  Morals  of  Apprentices  Act  (R.  373). 
This  Act,  though  largely  ineffectual  at  the  time,  ordered  impor- 
tant reforms  which  aroused  public  opinion  and  which  later  bore 
important  fruit.  By  it  the  employment  of  work -house  orphans^ 
was  limited;  it  forbade  the  labor  of  children  under  twelve,  for 
more  than  twelve  hours  a  day ;  provided  that  night  labor  of  chil- 
dren should  be  discontinued,  after  1804;  ordered  that  the  children 
so  employed  must  be  taught  reading  and  writing  and  ciphering, 
be  instructed  in  religion  one  hour  a  week,  be  taken  to  church 
every  Sunday,  and  be  given  one  new  suit  of  clothes  a  year;  ordered 
separate  sleeping  apartments  for  the  two  sexes,  and  not  over  two 
children  to  a  bed ;  and  provided  for  the  registration  and  inspection 
of  factories.    This  law  represents  the  beginnings  of  modern  child- 


448        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

labor  legislation.  It  was  1843  before  any  further  child-labor 
legislation  of  importance  was  enacted,  and  1878  before  a  compre- 
hensive chfldrlabor  bill  was  finally  passed.  In  the  United  States 
the  first  laws  regulating  the  emplo\Tnent  of  children  and  provid- 
ing for  their  school  attendance  were  enacted  by  Rhode  Island  in 
1840,  and  Massachusetts  in  1842.  Factor}-  legislation  in  other 
countries  has  been  a  product  of  more  recent  forces  and  times. 

To-day  important  child-labor  legislation  has  been  enacted  by 
all  progressive  nations,  and  the  lea^ang  world  nations  have  taken 
advanced  ground  on  the  question.(_i\U  recent  thinking  is  opposed 
to  cl^ds^i^  engtigiiig  ill  productive  labor}  With  the  rise  of  organ- 
ized labor,  and  the  extension  of  the  suffrage  to  the  laboring  man, 
he  has  joined  the  humanitarians  Iq  opp^tion  to  his  children  be- 
ing permitted  to  labor.  From  an  economic  point  of  \-iew  also,  all 
recent  studies  have  shown  the  unprofitableness  of  child  labor  and 
the  large  money-value,  under  pr^ent  industrial  conditions,  of  a 
good  education.  As  a  result  of  much  agitation  and  the  spread  of 
popular  education^  it  has  at  last  come  to  be  a  generally  accepted 
principle  (R.  374) /that  it  is  better  for  children  and  better  for  ^Qci- 
et>-  that  they  should  remain  in  school  imtil  they  are  at  least  four- 
teen years  of  age,  and  be  specially  trained  for  some  useful  tjpe  of 
work.^  Xow  shown  to  be  economically  unprofitable,  and  for  long 
mor^y  indefensible,  child  labor  is  now  rapidly  being  superseded 
by  smtable  education  and  the  vocational  training  and  guidance  of 
youth  in  all  progressive  nations. 

Compulsory  school-attendance  legislation.  The  natural  corol- 
kuy  of  the  taxation  of  the  wealth  of  the  State  to  educate  the  chil- 
dren of  the  State,  and  the  prohibition  of  children  to  labor,  is  the 
compulsion  of  chfldren  to  attend  school  that  they  may  receive  the 
instruction  and  training  which  the  State  has  deemed  it  wise  to 
tax  its  citizens  to  proxdde. 

Except  in  the  German  States,  compulsorj-  education  is  a  rela- 
tively recent  idea,  tiiough  in  its  origins  it  is  a  child  of  the  Protes- 
tant Reformation  theorj^  as  to  education  for  salvation.  In  Ger- 
man lands  the  compulsor^'-attendance  idea  took  deep  root,  and  in 
consequence  the  Germans  were  the  first  important  modem  nation 
to  enforce,  thoroughly,  the  eduction  of  aU.  By  the  middle  of 
the  eighteenth  centur>'  the  basis  was  dearly  laid  in  Prussia  for 
that  enforcement  of  the  compulsion  to  attend  schools  which,  by 
the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century,  had  become  such  a  notable 
characteristic  of  all  German  eduction.     The  same  compulsory 


NEW  TENDENCIES  AND  EXPANSIONS    449 

idea  early  took  deep  root  among  the  Scandinavian  peoples.  In 
consequence  the  lowest  illiteracy  in  Europe,  at  the  beginning  of 
the  nineteenth  century,  was  to  be  found  (see  map,  p.  397)  among 
the  Finns,  Swedes,  Norwegians.  Danes,  and  Germans. 

The  compulsory-attendance  idea  died  out  m  Amfcrica,  in  the 
Netherlands,  and  in  part  in  Scotland.  In  England  and  in  the 
Anglican  Colonies  in  America  it  never  took  root.  In  France  the 
idea  awaited  the  work  of  the  National  Convention,  which  (1792) 
ordered  thjee  years  of  education  compulsory  for  all.  War  and 
the  lack  of  interest  of  Napoleon  in  primary  education  caused  the 
requirement,  however,  to  become  a  dead  letter.  The  Law  of  1833 
pro\aded  for  but  did  not  enforce  it,  and  real  compulsory  education 
in  France  did  not  come  until  J882.  In  England  the  compulsory 
idea  received  but  little  attention  until  after  iSjo,  met  with  much 
opposition,  and  only  recently  have  comprehensive  reforms  been 
provided.  In  the  United  States  the  new  beginnings  of  compul- 
sorj^-attendance  legislation  date  from  the  Rhode  Island  child- 
labor  law  of  1840,  and  the  first  modem  compulsorj'-attendance 
law  enacted  by  Massachusetts,  in  1852.  By  1885,  fourteen 
American  States  and  six  Territories  had  enacted  some  form  of 
compulsor>'-attendance  law.  Siace  1900  there  has  been  a  general 
revision  of  American  state  legislation  on  the  subject,  with  a  view 
to  increasing  and  the  better  enforcement  of  the  compulsory- 
attendance  requirements,  and  with  a  general  demand  that  the 
National  Congress  should  enact  a  national  child-labor  law. 

As  a  result  of  this  legislation  the  labor  of  young  children  has 
been  greatly  restricted ;  work  in  many  industries  has  been  pro- 
hibited en^tirely,  because  of  the  danger  to  life  and  health^ompul- 
sory  education  has  been  extended  in  a  majority  of  the  American 
States  to  cover  the  full  school  year;  po\;;erty,  or  dependent  par- 
ents, in  many  States  no  longer  serves  as  an  excuse  for  ncm-^ftf^TiA- 
ance;  often  those  having  physical  or  mental  defects  also  are  in- 
cluded in  the  compulsion  to  attend,  if  their  wants  can  be  provided 
for;  the  school  census  has  been  changed  so  as  to  aid  in  the  location 
of  chil^ien  of  compulsory'  school-attendance  age;  and  special  offi- 
cers have  been  authorized  or  ordered  appointed  to  assist  school 
authorities  in  enforcing  the  compulsory-attendance  and  chdld- 
labor  laws.  Having  taxed  their  citizens  to  provide  schools,  the 
different  States  now  require  children  to  attend  and  partake  of  the 
advantages  pro\dded.  The  schools,  too,  have  made  a  close  study 
of  retarded  pupils,  because  of  the  close  connection  found  to  exist 


450 


A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


between  retardation  in  school  and  truancy  and  juvenile  delin- 
quency. 

The  education  of  defectives.  Another  nineteenth-jcejitury  ex- 
pansion of  state  education  has  come  in  the  provision  now  gener- 
ally made  for  the  education  of  defectives.  /To-day  the  state 

school  systems  of 
Christian  nations  gen- 
erally make  some  pro- 
vision for  state  insti- 
tutional care,  and 
often  for  local  classes 
as  well,  for  the  train- 
ing of  children  who 
belong  to  the  seri- 
ously defective  classes 
of  society.  This  work 
is.  almost  entirely  a 
product  of  the  new 
humanitarianism  of 
modern  times.  Ex- 
cepting the  education 
of  the  deaf,  seriously 
begun  a  little  earlier,  all  effective  work  dates  from  the  first  half 
of  the  nineteenth  century.  At  first  the  feasibility  of  all  such  in- 
struction was  doubted,  and  the  work  generally  was  commenced 
privately.  Out  of  successes  thus  achieved,  i)ublic  institutions 
have  been  built  up  to  carry  on,  on  a  large  scale,  what  was  begun 
privately  on  a  small  scale.  It  is  now  felt  to  be  better  for  the 
State,  as  well  as  for  the  unfortunates  themselves,  that  they  be 
cared  for  and  educated,  as  suitably  and  well  as  possible,  for  self- 
respect,  self-support,  and  some  form  of  social  and  vocational 
usefulness.  In  consequence,  the  compulsory-attendance  laws 
of  the  leading  world  States  to-day  require  that  defectives,  be- 
tween certain  ages  at  least,  be  sent  to  a  state  institution  or  be 
enrolled  in  a  public-school  class  specialized  for  their  training. 

Dependents,  orphans,  children  of  soldiers  and  sailors,  and  in- 
corrigibles  of  various  classes  represent  others  for  whom  modern 
States  have  now  provided  special  state  institutions.  To-day  a 
modern  State  finds  it  necessary  to  provide  a  number  of  such 
specialized  institutions,  or  to  make  arrangements  with  neigh- 
boring States  for  the  care  of  its  dependents,  if  it  is  to  meet 


Fig.  loo.  Rev.  Thomas  H.  Gallaudet 

TEACmNG  THE  DeAF  AND  DUMB 

From  a  bas-relief  on  the  monument  of  Gallaudet, 
erected  by  the  deaf  and  dumb  of  the  United  States, 
in  the  grounds  of  the  American  Asylum,  at  Hartford, 
Connecticut. 


NEW  TENDENCIES  AND  EXPANSIONS    451 

what  have  come  to  be  recognized  as  its  humanitariaii  educa- 
tional duties. 

Public  playgrounds  and  play  directors,  vacation  schools,  Juve- 
nile courts,  disciplinary  classes,  parental  schools,  classes  for  moth- 
ers, visiting  home-teachers  and  nurses,  and  child-weKare  societies 
and  officers,  are  other  means  for  caring  for  child  life  and  child  wel- 
fare which  have  all  been  begun  within  the  past  half -century.  The 
significance  of  these  additions  lies  chiefly  in  that  the  history  of  the 
attitude  of  nations  toward  their  child  life  is  the  history  of  the  rise 
of  humanitarianism,  altruism,  justice,  order,  morality,  and  civili- 
zation itself. 

The  education  of  superior  children.  All  the  work  described 
above  and  relating  to  the  work  of  defectives,  delixiquents,  and 
children  for  some  reason  in  need  of  special  attention  and  care  has 
been  for  those  who  represent  the  less  capable  and  on  the  whole 
less  useful  members  of  society  —  the  ones  from  whom  society 
may  expect  the  least.  They  are  at  the  same  time  the  most  costly 
wards  of  the  State. 

Wholly  within  the  second  decade  of  the  present  century,  and 
largely  as  a  result  of  the  work  of  the  French  psychologist  Alfred 
Binet  (1857-1911)  we  are  now  able  to  sort  out,  for  special  atten- 
tion, a  new  class  of  what  are  known  as  superior,  or  gifted  children, 
and  to  the  education  of  these  special  attention  is  to-day  here  and 
there  beginning  to  be  directed.  Educationally,  it  is  an  attempt  to 
do  for  democratic  forms  of  national  organization  what  a  two-class 
school  system  does  for  monarchical  forms,  but  to  select  intellec- 
tual capacity  from  the  whole  mass  of  the  people,  rather  than  from 
a  selected  class  or  caste.  We  know  now  that  the  number  of  chil- 
dren of  superior  ability  is  approximately  as  large  as  the  number  of 
the  feeble  in  mind,  and  also  that  the  future  of  democratic  govern- 
ments hinges  largely  upon  the  proper  education  and  utilization  of 
these  superior  children.  One  child  of  superior  intellectual  capac- 
ity, educated  so  as  to  utUize  his  talents,  may  confer  greater  bene- 
fits upon  mankind,  and  be  educationally  far  more  important,  than 
a  thousand  of  the  feeble-minded  children  upon  whom  we  have 
recently  come  to  put  so  much  educational  effort  and  expense. 
Questions  relating  to  the  training  of  leaders  for  democracy's  serv- 
ice attain  new  significance  in  terms  of  the  recent  ability  to  meas- 
ure and  grade  intelligence,  as  also  do  questions  relating  to  grad- 
ing, classification  in  school,  choice  of  studies,  rate  of  advancement, 
and  the  vocational  guidance  of  children  in  school. 


Age 

Worth 

o 

$90 

5 

950 

lO 

2000 

20 

4000 

30 

4icx> 

40 

3050 

SO 
60 

2900 
1650 

70 
80 

IS 

—  700 

452        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

The  new  interest  in  health.     Another  new  expansign  of  the 

educational  service  which  has  come  in  since  the  middle  of  the 

Net  Average  Worth  of  a  Person      nineteenth  century,  and  which  has 

recently  grown  to  be  one  of  large 
sigryficance,  is  work  in  the  medical 
inspection  of  schools,  the  supervision 
of  the  health  of  pupils,  and  the  new 
instruction  in  preventive  hygiene. 
This  is  a  product  of  the  scientifit 
and  social  and  industrial  revolu- 
tions which  the  nineteenth  century 

(Calculations  by  Dr.  William  Farr,  former-     1  ,.  .,  .1  p, 

ly  Registrar  of  Vital   Statistics  for  Great      OrOUght,    rathcr    than    01    humaillta- 

Britain.  Based  on  pre-war  values)  .   ■       .     „  ^  '      . 

.  nan  mnuences,  and  represents  an 

application  of  newly  discovered  scientific  knowledge  to  health 
work  among  children.  Its  basis  is  economic,  though  its  results 
are  largely  physical  and  educational  and  social  (R.  375). 

The  discovery  and  isolation  of  bacteria;  the  vast  amount  of 
new  knowledge  which  has  come  to  us  as  to  the  transmission  and 
possibilities  for  the  elimination  of  many  diseases;  the  spread  of 
informatipn  as  to  sanitary  science  and  preventive  medicine;  the 
change  in  emphs-sis  in  medical  practice,  from  curative  to  preven- 
tive and  remedial;  the  closer  crowding  together  of  all  classes  of 
people  in  cities;  the  change  of  habits  for  many  fromjife  in  the 
open  to  life  in  the  factory,  shop,  and  apartment;  and  the  growing 
realization  of  the  economic  value  to  the  nation  of  its  manhood 
and  womanhood;  have  all  alike  combined  with  modern  humani- 
tarianism  and  applied  Christianity  to  make  progressive  nations 
take  a  new  interest  in  child  health  and  proper  child  development. 
European  nations  have  so  far  done  much  more  in  school  health 
work  than  has  the  United  States,  though  a  very  commendable 
beginning  has  been  made  here. 

Medical  fnspection  and  health  supervision.  Medical  inspec- 
tion of  schools  began  in  France,  in  1837,  though  genuine  medical 
inspection,  in  a  modern  sense,  was  not  begun  in  France  until  1879. 
The  pioneer  country  for  real  work  was  Sweden,  where  health  offi- 
cers were  assigned  to  each  large  school  as  early  as  1868.  Norway 
made  such  appointments  optional  in  1885,  and  obligatory  in  1891. 
Belgium  began  the  work  in  1874.  Tests  of  eyesight  were  begun 
in  Dresden  in  1867.  Frankfort-on-Main  appointed  the  first  Ger- 
man school  physician  in  1888.  England  first  employed  school 
nurses  in  1887;  and,  in  1907,  following  the  revelations  as  to  low 


NEW  TENDENCIES  AND  EXPANSIONS    453 

physical  vitality  growing  out  of  the  Boer  War,  adopted  a  manda- 
tory medical-inspection  and  health-development  act  applying  to 
England  and  Wales,  and  the  year  following  Scotland  did  the  same. 
Argentine  and  Chili  both  instituted  such  service  in  1888,  and 
Japan  made  medical  inspection  compulsory  and  universal  in 
1898. 

In  the  United  States  the  work  was  begun  voluntarily  in  Boston, 
in  1894,  following  a  series  of  epidemics.  Chicago  organized  medi- 
cal inspection  in  1895,  New  York  City  in  1897,  and  Philadelphia 
in  1898.  From  these  larger  cities  the  idea  spread  to  the  smaller 
ones,  at  first  slowly,  and  then  very  rapidly.  The  first  school 
nurse  in  the  United  States  was  employed  in  New  York  City,  in 
fgoS^,  and  the  idea  at  once  proved  to  be  of  great  value.    In  1906 

[assachusetts  adopted  the  first  state  medical  inspection  law.  In 
191 2  Minnesota  organized  the  first  "State  Division  of  Health 
Supervision  of  Schools"  in  the  United  States,  and  this  plan  has 
since  been  followed  by  other  States. 

From  mere  medical  inspection  to  detect  contagious  diseases,  in 
which  the  movement  everywhere  began,  it  was  next  extended  to 
tests  for  eyesight  and  hearing,  to  be  made  by  teachers  or  physi- 
cians, and  has  since  been  enlarged  to  include  physical  examina- 
tions to  detect  hidden  diseases  and  a  constructive  health-program 
for  the  schools.  The  work  has  now  come  to  include  eye,  ear,  nose, 
throat,  and  teeth,  as  well  as  general  physical  examinations;  the 
supervision  of  the  teaching  of  hygiene  in  the  schools,  and  to  a  cer- 
tain extent  the  physical  training  and  playground  activities;  and  a 
constructive  program  for  the  development  of  the  health  and  phys- 
ical welfare  of  all  children.  All  this  represents  a  further  exten- 
sion of  the  public-education  idea. 

These  represent  some  of  the  more  important  new  problems  in 
education  which  have  come  to  challenge  us  since  the  school  was 
taken  over  from  the  Church  and  transformed  into  the  great  con- 
structive tool  of  the  State.  Their  solution  will  call  for  careful  in- 
vestigation, experimentation,  and  much  clear  thinking,  and  be- 
fore they  are  solved  other  new  problems  will  arise.  So  probably 
it  will  ever  be  imder  a  democratic  form  of  government;  only  in 
autocratic  or  strongly  monarchical  forms  of  government,  where 
the  study  of  problems  of  educational  organization  and  adjust- 
ment are  not  looked  upon  with  favor,  can  a  school  system  to-day 
remain  for  long  fixed  in  type  or  uniform  in  character.  Edugation 
to-day  has  become  intricate  and  difficult,  requiring  careful  pro- 


454        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

fessional  training  on  the  part  of  those  who  would  exercise  intelli- 
gent control,  and  so  intimately  connected  with  national  strength 
and  national  welfare  that  it  may  be  truthfully  said  to  have  be- 
come, in  many  respects,  the  most  important  constructive  under- 
taking of  a  modern  State. 

QUESTIONS  FOR  DISCUSSION 

1.  Show  that  education  must  be  extended  and  increased  in  efficiency  in 
proportion  as  the  suffrage  is  extended,  and  additional  political  functions 
given  to  the  electorate.    Illustrate. 

2.  Trace  the  changes  in  the  character  of  the  instruction  given  in  the  schools^ 
paralleling  such  changes. 

3.  Explain  the  difference  in  use  of  the  schools  for  nationality  ends  in  Ger- 
many and  France. 

4.  Of  what  is  the  recent  development  of  evening,  adult,  and  extension  edu- 
cation an  index? 

5.  Show  why  university  education  is  more  important  in  national  life  to-day 
than  ever  before  in  history. 

6.  Explain  the  reasons  for  the  new  conceptions  as  to  the  value  of  child  life 
which  have  come  within  the  past  hundred  years,  in  all  advanced  nations. 
Why  not  in  the  less  advanced  nations? 

7.  Show  the  relation  between  the  breakdown  of  the  apprentice  system,  the 
Industrial  Revolution,  and  the  rise  of  compulsory  school  attendance. 

8.  Show  that  compulsory  school  attendance  is  a  natural  corollary  to  general 
taxation  for  education. 

9.  How  do  you  account  for  the  relatively  recent  interest  in  the  education  of 
defectives  and  delinquents?    Of  what  is  this  interest  an  expression? 

10.  Does  the  obligation  assumed  to  educate  involve  any  greater  exercise  of 
state  authority  or  recognition  of  duty  than  the  advancement  of  the 
health  of  the  people  and  the  sanitary  welfare  of  the  State? 

SELECTED  READINGS 

In  the  accompanying  Book  of  Readings  the  following  selections  illustrative 
of  the  contents  of  this  chapter  are  reproduced: 

367.  McKechnie,  W.  S.:  The  Environmental  Influence  of  the  State. 

368.  Emperor  William  II.:  German  Secondary  Schools  arid  National 

Ends. 

369.  Van  Hise,  Chas.  R.:  The  University  and  the  State. 

370.  Friend:  What  the  Folk  High  Schools  have  done  for  Denmark. 

371.  U.S.  Commission:  The  German  System  of  Vocational  Education. 

372.  U.S.  Commission:  Vocational  Education  and  National  Prosperity. 

373.  De  Montmorency :  English  Conditions  before  the  First  Factory -Labor 

Act. 

374.  Giddings,  F.  R. :  The  New  Problem  of  Child  Labor. 

^75.  Hoag,  E.  B.,  and  Terman,  L.  M.:  Health  Work  in  the  Schools. 

SUPPLEMENTARY  REFERENCES 

*Allen,  E.  A.     "Education  of  Defectives";  in  Butler,  N.  M.,  Education  in 
the  United  States,  pp.  771-820. 
Barnard,  Henry.     National  Education  in  Europe. 


NEW  TENDENCIES  AND  EXPANSIONS     455 

*Commission  on  National  Aid  to  Vocational  Education,  Report,  vol.  I. 
(Document  1004,  H.  R.,  63d  Congress,  2d  session,  Washington,  1914.) 
Cook,  W.  A.     "A  Brief  Survey  of  the  Development  of  Compulsory  Edu- 
cation in  the  United  States";  in  Elementary  School  Teacher,  vol.  12, 
PP- 331-35-     (March,  1912.) 
*Dean,  A.  D.     The  Worker  and  the  State. 
Eliot,  C.  W.     Education  for  Efficiency.  * 

Farrington,  F.  E.     Commercial  Education  in  Germany. 
Foght,  H.  W.     Rural  Denmark  and  its  Schools. 

Friend,  L.  L.    The  Folk  High  Schools  of  Denmark.    (Bulletin  No.  3,  1914, 
United  States  Bureau  of  Education.) 
*Hoag,  E.  B.,  and  Terman,  L.  M.     Health  Work  in  the  Schools. 
Kandel,  I.  L.    "The  Junior  High  School  in  European  Systems";  in  Edu- 
cational Review,  vol.  58,  pp.  305-29.     (Nov.  1919.) 
*Munroe,  J.  P.    New  Demands  in  Education. 
*Payne,  G.  H.     The  Child  in  Human  Progress. 
Smith,  A.  T.,  and  Jesien,  W.  S.    Higher  Technical  Education  in  Foreign 
Countries.     (Bulletin  No.  11,  1917,  United  States  Bureau  of  Educa- 
tion.) 
Snedden,  D.  S.     Vocational  Education. 
*Terman,  L.  M.     The  Intelligence  of  School  Children. 
Waddle,  C.  W.     Introduction  to  Child  Psychology,  chap.  i. 
Ware,  Fabian.    Educational  Foundations  of  Trade  and  Industry. 


CONCLUSION;  THE  FUTURE 

We  have  now  reached  the  end  of  the  story  of  the  rise  and  progress 
of  man's  conscious  effort  to  improve  himself  and  advance  the  wel- 
fare of  his  group  by  means  of  education.  To  one  who  has  fol- 
lowed the  narrative  thus  far  it  must  be  evident  how  fully  this  con- 
scious effort  has  paralleled  the  history  of  the  rise  and  progress  of 
western  civilization  itself.  Beginning  first  among  the  Greeks  — 
the  first  people  in  history  to  be  "smitten  with  the  passion  for 
truth,"  the  first  possessing  sufficient  courage  to  put  faith  in  rea- 
son, and  the  first  to  attempt  to  reconcile  the  claims  of  the  State 
and  the  individual  and  to  work  out  a  plan  of  "ordered  liberty  "  — 
a  new  spirit  was  born  and  in  time  passed  on  to  the  western  world. 
As  Butcher  well  says  (R.  ii),  "  the  Greek  genius  is  the  European 
genius  in  its  first  and  brightest  bloom,  and  from  a  vivifying  con- 
tact with  the  Greek  spirit  Europe  derived  that  new  and  mighty 
impulse  which  we  call  Progress."  Hellenizing  first  the  Eastern 
Mediterranean,  and  then  taking  captive  her  rude  conqueror,  the 
Hellenization  of  the  Roman  and  early  Christian  world  was  the 
result. 

Then  followed  the  reaction  under  early  Christian  rule,  and  the 
fearful  deluge  of  barbarism  which  for  centuries  well-nigh  extin- 
guished both  the  ancient  learning  and  the  new  spirit.  Finally, 
after  the  long  mediaeval  night,  came  "time's  burst  of  dawn,"  first 
and  for  a  long  time  confined  to  Italy,  but  later  extending  to  all 
northern  lands,  and  in  the  century  of  revival  and  rediscovery  and 
reconstruction  the  Greek  passion  for  truth  and  the  Greek  courage 
to  trust  reason  were  reawakened,  and  once  more  made  the  heri- 
tage of  the  western  world.  Once  again  the  Greek  spirit,  the  spirit 
of  freedom  and  progress  and  trust  in  the  power  of  truth,  became 
the  impulse  that  was  to  guide  and  dominate  the  future.  To  fol- 
low reason  without  fear  of  consequences,  to  substitute  scientific 
for  empirical  knowledge,  to  equip  men  for  intelligent  participa- 
tion in  civic  life,  to  discover  a  rational  basis  for  conduct,  to  unfold 
and  expand  every  inborn  faculty  and  energy,  and  to  fill  man  with 
a  restless  striving  after  an  ideal  —  these  essentially  Greek  charac- 
teristics in  time  came  to  be  accepted  by  an  increasing  number  of 
modern  men,  as  they  had  been  by  the  thoughtful  men  of  the  an- 
cient Greek  world,  as  the  law  and  goal  of  human  endeavor.    From 


CONCLUSION;  THE  FUTURE  457 

this  point  on  the  intellectual  progress  of  the  western  world  was 
certain,  though  at  times  the  rate  seems  painfully  slow. 

The  great  events  which  stand  out  in  modern  history  —  mile- 
stones, as  it  were,  along  the  road  of  the  intellectual  progress  of 
mankind  in  the  recovery  of  the  Greek  spirit  —  were  the  revival 
of  the  ancient  learning,  the  Protestant  appeal  to  reason,  the  re- 
covery and  vast  extension  of  the  old  scientific  knowledge,  the  as- 
sertion of  the  rights  of  the  individual  as  opposed  to  the  rights  of 
the  State,  and  the  growth  of  a  new  humanitarianism,  induced  by 
the  teachings  of  Christianity,  which  has  softened  old  laws  and 
awakened  a  new  conception  of  the  value  of  child  and  human  life. 
Out  of  these  great  historic  movements  have  come  modem  schol- 
arship, the  inestimable  boon  of  religious  liberty,  the  firm  estab- 
lishment of  the  idea  of  the  reign  of  law  in  an  orderly  universe,  the 
conception  of  government  as  in  the  interests  of  the  governed,  the 
substitution  of  democracy  and  political  equality  for  the  rule  of  a 
class  or  an  autocratic  power,  and  the  assertion  of  the  right  to  an 
education  at  public  expense  as  a  birthright  of  every  child.  The 
common  school,  the  education  of  all,  equality  of  rights  and  op- 
portunity, full  and  equal  suffrage,  the  responsibility  of  all  for  the 
advancement  of  the  common  welfare,  and  liberty  under  law  have 
been  the  natural  consequences  and  the  outcome  of  these  great 
struggles  to  set  free  and  quicken  the  human  spirit. 

The  Peace  of  Westphalia  (1648),  which  marked  the  close  of  a 
century  of  effort  to  crush  human  reason  and  religious  liberty  with 
violence  and  oppression,  marked  a  turning-point  in  the  history  of 
the  world.  Though  religious  intolerance  and  bigotry  might  still 
persist  in  places  for  centuries  to  come,  this  Peace  acknowledged 
the  futility  of  persecution  to  stamp  out  human  inquiry,  and 
marked  the  downfall  of  intellectual  mediaevahsm.  The  work  of 
the  political  philosophers  of  the  eighteenth  century,  the  estab- 
lishment of  a  new  poHtical  ideal  by  the  leaders  of  the  American 
Revolution,  and  the  drastic  sweeping-away  of  ancient  abuses  in 
Church  and  State  in  the  Revolution  in  France,  applied  a  new 
spirit  to  government,  ushered  in  the  rule  of  the  common  man,  and 
began  the  establishment  of  democracy  as  the  ruling  form  of  gov- 
ernment for  mankind.  The  recent  World  War  in  Europe  was  in  a 
sense  a  sequel  to  what  had  gone  before.  One  result  of  its  out- 
come, despite  certain  reactionary  but  temporary  old-type  gov- 
ernments that  the  near  future  may  see  set  up  in  places,  has  been 
the  elimination  of  the  mediaeval  theory  of  the  'divine  right  of 


458        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

kings"  from  the  continent  of  Europe,  and  the  establishment  of 
the  democratic  type  of  government  as  the  ruling  type  of  the  fu- 
ture. Some  of  the  nations,  such  as  Poland  and  Jugo-Slavia,  for  a 
time  will  be  in  a  sense  experimental,  and  even  well-governed  Ger- 
many must  learn  new  forms  and  ways,  but  in  time  government  of 
and  by  and  for  the  people  is  practically  certain  to  become  estab- 
lished everywhere  on  the  continent  of  Europe. 

Still  more,  the  outcome  of  the  World  War  would  seem  to  indi- 
cate that  democratic  forms  of  government  are  destined  in  time  to 
extend  to  peoples  everywhere  who  have  the  capacity  for  using 
them.  The  great  problem  of  the  coming  century,  then,  and  per- 
haps even  of  succeeding  centuries,  will  be  to  make  democracy  a 
safe  form  of  government  for  the  world.  This  can  be  done  only  by 
a  far  more  general  extension  of  educational  opportunities  and  ad- 
vantages than  the  world  has  as  yet  witnessed.  In  the  hands  of  an 
uneducated  proletariat  democracy  is  a  dangerous  instrument.  In 
Russia,  Mexico,  and  in  certain  of  the  Central  American  Republics 
we  see  what  a  democracy  results  in  in  the  hands  of  an  uneducated 
people.  There,  too  often,  the  revolver  instead  of  the  ballot  box  is 
used  to  settle  public  issues,  and  instead  of  orderly  government 
under  law  we  have  a  reign  of  injustice  and  anarchy.  Only  by  the 
slow  but  sure  means  of  general  education  of  the  masses  in  charac- 
ter and  in  the  fundamental  bases  of  liberty  under  law  can  govern- 
ments that  are  safe  and  intelligent  be  created.  In  a  far  larger 
sense  than  anything  we  have  as  yet  witnessed,  education  must  be- 
come the  constructive  tool  for  national  progress. 

The  great  needs  of  the  modern  world  call  for  the  general  diffu- 
sion among  the  masses  of  mankind  of  the  intellectual  and  spiritual 
and  political  gains  of  the  centuries,  which  are  as  yet,  despite  the 
great  recent  progress  made  in  extending  general  education,  the 
possession  of  but  a  relatively  small  number  of  the  world's  popula- 
tion. Among  the  more  important  of  these  are  the  religious  spirit, 
coupled  with  full  religious  liberty  and  tolerance;  a  clear  recogni- 
tion of  the  rights  of  minorities,  so  long  as  they  do  not  impair  the 
advancement  of  the  general  welfare;  the  general  diffusion  of  a 
knowledge  of  the  more  common  truths  and  applications  of  science, 
particularly  as  these  relate  to  personal  hygiene,  sanitation,  agri- 
culture, and  modern  industrial  processes ;  the  general  education  of 
all,  not  only  in  the  tools  of  knowledge,  but  in  those  fundamental 
principles  of  self-government  which  lie  at  the  basis  of  democratic 
life;  training  in  character,  self-control,  and  in  the  ability  to  as- 


CONCLUSION;  THE  FUTURE  459 

sume  and  carry  responsibility;  the  instilling  into  a  constantl\ 
widening  circle  of  mankind  the  importance  of  fidelity  to  duty, 
truth,  honor,  and  virtue;  the  emphasis  of  the  many  duties  and  re- 
sponsibilities which  encompass  all  in  the  complex  modem  world, 
rather  than  the  eighteenth-century  individualistic  conception  of 
political  and  personal  rights ;  the  clear  distinction  between  liberty 
and  license ;  and  the  conception  of  liberty  guided  by  law.  In  addi- 
tion, each  man  and  woman  should  be  educated  for  personal  effi- 
ciency in  some  vocation  or  form  of  service  in  which  each  can  best 
realize  his  personal  possibilities,  and  at  the  same  time  render  the 
largest  service  to  that  society  of  which  he  forms  a  part. 

The  great  needs  of  the  modern  world  also  call  for  that  form  of 
education  and  training  which  will  not  merely  impart  literacy  and 
prepare  for  economic  competence  and  national  citizenship,  but 
which  will  give  to  national  groups  a  new  conception  of  national 
character  and  international  morality  and  create  new  standards 
of  value  for  human  effort.  National  character  and  international 
morality  are  always  the  outgrowth  of  the  personality  of  a  people, 
and  this  in  turn  calls  for  the  inculcation  of  humane  ideals,  the 
proper  discipline  of  the  instincts,  the  training  of  a  will  to  do  right, 
good  physical  vigor,  and,  to  a  large  degree,  the  development  of 
individual  efficiency  and  economic  competence.  Moral  and  reli- 
gious instruction,  as  it  has  been  given,  will  not  suffice,  because  it 
does  not  reach  the  heart  of  the  problem.  No  nation  has  shown 
more  completely  the  utter  futility  of  religious  instruction  to  pro- 
duce morality  than  has  Germany,  where  the  instruction  of  all  in 
the  principles  of  religion  has  been  required  for  centuries. 

The  problem  of  the  twentieth  century,  then,  and  probably  of 
other  centuries  to  come,  is  how  the  constructive  forces  in  modem 
society,  of  which  the  schools  of  nations  should  stand  first,  can 
best  direct  their  efforts  to  influence  and  direct  the  deeper  sources 
of  the  life  of  a  people,  so  that  the  national  characteristics  it  is 
desired  to  display  to  the  world  will  be  developed  because  the 
schools  have  instilled  into  every  child  these  national  ideals.  Many 
forces  must  cooperate  in  such  a  task,  but  unless  the  schools  of 
nations  become  clearly  conscious  of  national  needs  and  of  inter- 
national purposes,  become  inspired  by  an  ideal  of  service  for  the 
weKare  of  mankind,  substitute  among  national  groups  competi- 
tion in  the  things  of  the  spirit  —  art,  architecture,  music,  sports, 
education,  letters,  sanitation,  housing,  public  works,  and  such 
applications  of  science  as  minister  to  health  and  happiness  —  for 


46o        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 


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competition  in  the  creation  of  material  wealth,  the  piling-up  of 
armaments,  the  extension  of  national  boundaries,  and  the  present 
overemphasis  of  a  narrow  nationalism,  and  direct  the  energies  of 
coming  generations  to  the  carrying-out  of  this  new  and  larger 


CONCLUSION;  THE  FUTURE  461 

human  service,  nations  must  inevitably  fail  to  reach  the  world 
position  they  might  otherwise  have  occupied,  destructive  inter- 
national competition  and  warfare  will  continue,  and  the  advance- 
ment of  world  civilization  and  international  well-being  will  be 
greatly  retarded  thereby. 

In  this  work  of  advancing  world  civilization,  the  nations  which 
have  long  been  in  the  forefront  of  progress  must  expect  to  assume 
important  roles.  It  is  their  peculiar  mission  —  for  long  clearly 
recognized  by  Great  Britain  and  France  in  their  political  rela- 
tions with  inferior  and  backward  peoples;  by  the  United  States  in 
its  excellent  work  in  Cuba,  Porto  Rico,  and  the  Philippines;  and 
clearly  formulated  in  the  system  of  "mandatories"  under  the 
League  of  Nations  —  to  help  backward  peoples  to  advance,  and 
to  assist  them  in  lifting  themselves  to  a  higher  plane  of  world  civi- 
lization. In  doing  this  a  very  practical  type  of  education  must 
naturally  play  the  leading  part,  and  time,  probably  much  time, 
will  be  required  to  achieve  any  large  results.  Disregarding  the 
large  need  for  such  service  among  the  leading  world  nations,  the 
map  reproduced  opposite  reveals  how  much  of  such  work 
still  remains  to  be  done  in  the  world  as  a  whole.  "The 
White  Man's  Burden"  truly  is  large,  and  the  larger  world  tasks 
of  the  twentieth  century  for  the  more  advanced  nations  will  be  to 
help  other  peoples,  in  distant  and  more  backward  lands,  slowly 
to  educate  themselves  in  the  difficult  art  of  self-government, 
gradually  establish  stable  and  democratic  governments  of  their 
own,  and  in  time  to  take  their  places  among  the  enlightened  and 
responsible  peoples  of  the  earth. 

At  the  bottom  of  all  this  work  and  service  lies  the  new  human- 
liberty  conceptions  first  worked  out  and  formulated  for  the  world 
by  little  Greece.  In  time  the  ideas  to  which  they  gave  expression 
have  become  the  heritage  of  what  we  know  as  our  western  civiliza- 
tion, and  the  warp  and  woof  of  the  intellectual  and  political  life  of 
the  modern  world.  As  a  result  of  the  Industrial  Revolution,  and 
of  the  new  political  and  commercial  and  social  forces  of  our  time, 
this  western  civilization,  using  education  as  its  great  constructive 
tool,  is  now  spreading  to  every  continent  on  the  globe.  The  task 
of  succeeding  centuries  will  be  to  carry  forward  and  extend  what 
has  been  so  well  begun;  to  level  up  the  p)eoples  of  the  earth, 
as  far  as  inherent  differences  in  capacity  will  permit;  and  to  ex- 
tend, through  educative  influences,  the  principles  and  practices  of 
a  Christian  civilization  to  all.    Li  establishing  intelligent  and  in- 


462        A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION 

terested  government,  and  in  moulding  and  shaping  the  destinies 
of  peoples,  general  education  has  become  the  great  constructive 
tool  of  modern  civilization.  A  hundred  and  fifty  years  ago  edu- 
cation was  of  but  little  importance,  being  primarily  an  instrument 
of  the  Church  and  used  for  church  ends.  To-day  general  educa- 
tion is  an  instrument  of  government,  and  is  rightfully  regarded 
as  a  prime  essential  to  good  government  and  national  progress. 
With  the  spread  of  the  democratic  type  the  importance  of  the 
school  is  enhanced,  its  control  by  the  State  becomes  essential,  its 
continued  expansion  to  include  new  types  of  schools  and  new 
forms  of  educational  opportunities  and  service  a  necessity,  the 
study  of  its  organization  and  administration  and  problems  be- 
comes a  necessary  function  of  government,  while  the  training 
it  can  give  is  dignified  and  made  the  birthright  of  every  boy 
and  girl. 


INDEX 


Academy,  the,  23;  at  Venice,  134;  in  Europe 
and  America,  215,  248,  385. 

Act  of  Conformity,  172;  of  Supremacy,  159, 
321, 358- 

Adelhard,  98. 

Advisory  Order  of  1717,  309. 

Agriculture,  beginnings  of  instruction  in, 
302. 

Agricultvural  Institute  of  Fellenberg,  302. 

Alcuin,  76-80. 

Alexandria,  importance  of,  in  historj',  25. 

Alexandrian  learning,  25,  381. 

Alfred,  King,  81. 

Algemeine  Landrecht,  the,  313. 

Alhazen,  98. 

America,  battles  for  schools  in,  370;  begins 
constitutional  government,  267;  colonial 
colleges  in,  388;  contributions  to  world 
history,  268;  educational  ladder  evolved, 
392;  effect  of  Revolutionary  War  on 
schools,  354;  Protestant  settlement  of,  189; 
public  school  system,  outlines  evolved,  362. 

Anglican  educational  foundations,  170-73. 

Apprenticeship  education,  109,  242,  446; 
breakdown  of,  449. 

Argentine,  The,  education  in,  399. 

Aristotle,  23,  98,  225,  390;  translations  of, 
98. 

Arithmetic,  in  Greece,  11;  in  Middle  Ages, 
160,  280;  in  Rome,  34;  in  Seven  Liberal 
Arts,  86;  first  modem  texts  in,  237. 

Arnold,  Matthew,  on  Guizot,  332. 

Astr9nomy,  in  Seven  Liberal  Arts,  86. 

Athenian  education,  the  new,  19-26;  the  old, 
8-17. 

Athens,  imiversity  of,  23 . 

Attica,  andent,  5. 

Australia,  education  in,  399. 

Austrian  reformers,  256. 

Austrian  School  Code  of  1774,  312. 

Averroes,  98. 

Avicenna,  104. 

Baccalaureus,  in  a  mediaeval  university,  116. 

Bacon,  Sir  Francis,  209. 

Bagdad,  Mohammedan  learning  at,  96. 

Balfour  Annexation  Law  of  1912,  348. 

Barbarian  migrations,  63-69. 

Barbarian  tribes  accept  Christieinity,  66. 

Barnard,  Henry,  380-81. 

Basedow,  J.  B.,  294-96 

Battles  for  education  in  U.S.,  370. 

Bell,  .\ndrew,  339. 

Benedict,  St.,  54, 99. 

Benedictines,  54, 100. 

Berlin,  University  of,  319. 


Bible,  translation  of,  166. 

Bills  of  Rights,  269,  270. 

Blind,  education  of,  450. 

Blow,  Susan,  426. 

Boccaccio,  132. 

Bologna,  law  developed  at,  102. 

Boston,  first  high  school  at,  387. 

Boston  Latin  School,  193 . 

Brahe,  Tycho,  208. 

Brazil,  education  in,  399,  400. 

British  Museum  founded,  266. 

Brothers  of  the  Christian  Schools,  183,  282, 

329- 
Brougham,  Lord,  349. 
Bnmo,  Giordano,  208. 
Billow,  Baroness,  425. 
Bunyan,  John,  265. 
Burgher  class,  rise  of,  107. 
Burgher  school,  107,  146,  165,  331. 

Cadet  years,  in  ancient  Greece,  15. 

Cahiers  of  1789,  279. 

Calvin,  John,  159,  175. 

Calvinists,  educational  work  of,  175-78. 

Campion,  teaching  of,  150. 

Canada,  education  in,  398. 

Canon  Law  organized,  103. 

Carter,  James  G.,  387,  388. 

Catechetical  schools,  50. 

Catechism,  166,  202,  236. 

Catechumenal  instruction,  50. 

Cathedral  schools,  53,  84,  188. 

Cathedral  school  at  York,  76. 

Catherine  II  of  Rusaa,  258,  278,  511,  715. 

Cato  the  Elder,  35. 

Certificates,  first  teachers',  93. 

Cessatio,  in  mediasval  universities,  115. 

Chalotais,  Rene  de  la,  277. 

Chantry  schools,  84. 

Charity  school,  religious,  240,  336;  in  New 
Jersey,  375;  in  Pennsylvania,  373-74- 

Charlemagne,  his  work,  77-80;  his  proclama- 
tions, 78-79. 

Childhood,  care  of,  245,  630. 

Child  Labor,  447. 

Chili,  education  in,  400. 

China,  educational  system  of,  402,  789. 

Chivalric  commandments,  91 . 

Chivalric  education,  88-91 . 

Chivalric  ideals,  90. 

Christianity,  challenge  of,  47;  contribution 
of,  44-67;  influence  of,  on  barbarians, 
66-70;  rejects  pagan  learning,  51;  where 
arose,  45. 

Chrysoloras,  Manuel,  133. 

Church  and  elementary  education,  182-84; 


11 


INDEX 


early  organization  of,  150;  work  of,  in 

Middle  Ages,  67. 
Cicero,  Petrarch  discovers   work   of,   131, 

142. 
Cireronian  style,  147,  150,  213. 
Cities,  development  of,  in  U.S.,  363;  new 

problems  arising  in,  364. 
Citizen-cadet,  in  Ancient  Greece,  14. 
City  class,  rise  of,  106;  in  U.S.,  363. 
City  life,  revival  of,  106. 
City  school  societies  in  U.S.,  358. 
Code  Napoleon,  273,  284. 
Colet,  John,  147,  148. 
College  de  France,  144;  de  Guyenne,  144. 
Colleges  in  the  U.S.,  by  i860,  389;  by  1900, 

390;  colonial,  388. 
Comenius,  John  Amos,  220-24. 
Commerce,  revival  of,  106. 
Communal  colleges  of  France,  595. 
Compulsory  school  attendance,  448-49. 
Condorcet,  281,  329,  333. 
Cormecticut,  Barnard  in,  690;  Law  of  1650, 

196. 
Constance,  Council  of,  155. 
Constantine  accepts  Christianity,  49. 
Constantine,  of  Carthage,  115. 
Constituent  Assembly  of  France,  278. 
Constitutional  government  begins,  in  Amer- 
ica, 267-70;  in  France,  271 ;  in  ot.her  lands, 

273- 
Convention,  National,  of  France,  282-84. 
Convents,  and  their  schools,  76,  83. 
Copernicus,  Nicholas,  207. 
Council  of  Constance,  155. 
Council  of  Trent,  161,  179. 
Counting-board,  Greek,  11;  Roman,  34. 
Court  schools  of  Italy,  142-44. 
Cousin,  Victor,  329,  751. 
Crusade  movement,  104-06. 
Cuba,  education  in,  442. 

Dame  School,  in  England,  239;  in  U.S.,  193, 
361. 

Dante,  130. 

Dartmouth  College  decision,  391, 

Deaf,  education  of,  450. 

Defectives,  education  of,  450. 

Defoe's  Robinson  Crusoe,  265. 

Democracy,  spread  of  idea,  273,  458. 

Denmark,  educational  system  of,  396. 

Dewey,  John,  435-37. 

Dialectic,  in  Seven  Liberal  Arts,  86;  super- 
sedes Grammar,  100. 

Diderot,  260,  278,  511. 

Diesterweg,  316,  582. 

Dinter,  G.  F.,  316-17. 

Directory,  the,  in  France,  284. 

Discipline,  school,  244;  by  a  Swabian 
schoolmaster,  244-45. 

Disputation,  university,  119. 

Dutch,  early  education  among,  175-78. 


Education  a  national  tool,  410;  problems  of, 
in  the  future,  456. 

Educational  societies,  in  England,  344;  in 
U.S.,  358. 

Eighteenth  century,  importance  of,  253. 

Elementarwerk  of  Basedow,  295. 

Elementary  school  curriculum,  evolution  of, 
414-16. 

Encyclopaedia,  first  modern,  266. 

Engine,  steam,  266. 

England,  Annexation  Law  of  1902, 348;  early 
child  labor  laws,  447;  educational  system 
evolved,  349;  Fisher  Education  Act  of 
1918,  349;  progress  since  1870,  348;  pupil- 
teacher  system  in,  346;  Reform  Bill  of 
1832,  346,  441;  of  1867,  347,  441. 

English  Bible,  231. 

English  eighteenth-century  educational  ef- 
forts, 336. 

English  grammar  _chools,  147-48. 

English  Law  of  1833,  346. 

English  Law  of  1870,  348. 

English  liberty,  beginnings  of,  261. 

English  parliamentary  battle  for  schools, 

344-49- 
English  period  of  philanthropic  effort,  338- 

44- 
Ephebic  oath,  the,  15. 
Ephebic  years,  in  ancient  Greece,  15. 
Episcopal  schools,  53. 
Erasmus,  139. 

Ernest,  Duke,  educational  work  of,  168, 315. 
Euclid,  translations  of,  98. 
Europe,  illiteracy  in,  in  1900,  397. 

Faculties,  in  a  mediaeval  university,  117. 

Farraday,  404. 

Fellenberg  and  his  Institutions,  302. 

Feudalism,  87. 

Fichte,  J.  G.,  315. 

Finland,  education  in,  158,  396;  manual 
training  in,  428. 

Five-Mile  Act,  the,  172. 

Florence,  Medicean  Library  at,  135;  revival 
of  study  of  Greek  at,  133. 

France,  creation  of  primary  education  in, 
325;  educational  organization  under  Na- 
poleon, 325-28;  eighteenth-century  condi- 
tions in,  259;  higher  schools  created  by 
Napoleon,  327;  Law  of  1793,  282;  Law  of 
1795,  283,  325;  Law  of  1802,  325-27;  Law 
of  1833,  330-32;  progress  since  1870,  332; 
revolution  in  thinking,  in  i8th  century, 
260;  revolutionary  pedagogy  of,  276-83; 
school  system  created,  331 ;  special  revolu- 
tionar}'  foundations,  283-84;  University 
of,  created,  327. 

Francke's  Institutions,  413. 

Frederick  the  Great,  234,  246,  255-56;  311- 
13- 

Frederick  William  I,  255. 


INDEX 


111 


French  Revolution,  270-72. 
Froebel,  Fr.,  424-28. 

Galen,  103. 

Galileo,  G.,  208. 

Gallaudet,  Thos.  R.,  450. 

Gaza,  Theodorus,  144. 

Geneva,  center  of  Calvinism,  175. 

Geographical  discovery,  revival  of,  137. 

Geometry,  in  Seven  Liberal  Arts,  86. 

Gerhard  of  Cremona,  98. 

German   education,   development   of.    See 

Prussia. 
German  school  organization,  early,  169, 308. 
Girls,  education  of,  in  early  Church,  55. 
Gotha,  Duke  Ernest's  work  in,  168,  315. 
Grammar,  at  Rome,  35;  in  Seven  Liberal 

Arts,  86,  116,  118. 
Grammar  schools,  English,  147-48;  349. 
Grammaticus,  35. 
Grammatist,  school  of,  10. 
Gratian  organizes  Canon  Law,  103. 
Greece,  early  education  in,  7 ;  golden  age  of, 

19;  land  and  government  of,  5;  our  debt 

to,  25,  456. 
Greek  Chiu'ch,  in  education  in  East,  319. 
Greek  conquest  of  Eastern  Mediterranean, 

24. 
Greek  education,  the  old,  3-18;  the  new,  19- 

27;  results  under  old,  15. 
Greek  higher  education,  spread  and  influence 

of,  24. 
Greek  language  and  learning,  preservation 

of,  26. 
Greek  learning,  in  Syria,  96;  forgotten,  51; 

revival  of,  133. 
Greek  universities,  ancient,  23. 
Gregorian  calendar,  210. 
Guarino  da  Verona,  133. 
Guilds  of  Middle  Ages,  108;  university  de- 
grees in,  115,  116. 
Guizot,  M.,  330. 
Gulliver's  Travels,  265. 
Gymnasia,  German,  222,  312,  316,  319. 
Gymnasial  training  in  Ancient  Greece,  13. 
Gymnasium,  ancient  Greek,  14, 272;  Sturm's, 

147;  Comenius,  222. 
Gymnastics  in  Greek  education,  12-15. 

Hanseatic  League,  107. 

Haroun-jd-Raschid,  96. 

Harris,  William  T.,  426. 

Harvard  Colleg2,  early  history  of,  193,  389; 

founding  of,  193. 
Health,  new  interest  in,  452. 
Health  supervision,  452. 
Hebrews,  early,  45-47. 
Hecker,  Julius,  311,  413. 
Hedge  schools,  241. 
Hellenization  of  Eastern  Mediterranean,  24; 

of  Rome,  32. 


Herbart,  J.  Fr., 419-24;  contributions  of,423. 
Herbartian  ideas,  in  Germany,  422;  in  U.S., 

422;  Herbartian  method,  421. 
High  school,  in  U.S.,  battle  to  establish,  384- 

88;  first,  387;  for  agriculture,  802;  Massa- 
chusetts law  of  1827,  387. 
Hippocrates,  103. 
Hodder's  Arithmetic,  237. 
Holland,  education  in,  177,  396. 
Horn  Book,  234,  235. 

Huguenots,  159, 176,356;  in  education,  176. 
Humanism,  a  religious  reform  movement, 

154;  in  France,  144;  in  England,  147-48; 

in  Germany,  145;  rise  and  spread  of,  142- 

150. 
Humanistic  course  of  study,  143. 
Himianistic  realism,  213-16. 
Humboldt,  Wilhelm  von,  work  of,  in  creating 

the  University  of  Berlin,  319. 
Huxley,  Thomas,  350. 

Illiteracy,  in  Europe  by  1900,  397. 
Industrial  revolution,  406,  443;  effects  of, 

on  education,  407,  408-11. 
Industry,  revival  of,  in  Middle  Ages,  106. 
Infant  schools,  in  England,  342-44;  in  U.S., 

361. 
Innovators,  ideas  of,  219. 
Institute  of  France,  281 . 
Institutes  of  Justinian,  102. 
Institutions    created    by    Convention     in 

France,  283. 
Imerius  of  Bologna,  102,  115. 

Japan,  education  in,  400;  school  system  cre- 
ated, 401. 
Jefferson,  Thomas,  287. 
•Jerome,  St.,  55. 
Jesuit  colleges,  180. 
Jesuit  education,  178-82, 
Jesuit  methods,  180. 
Jesuit  teachers,  training  of,  181, 
Jesus,  his  teachings,  47. 
Jesus,  Society  of,  178-82. 
Jewish  faith,  early,  45-47- 
Joseph  II,  256. 
Justinian,  Institutes  of,  102. 

Kalamazoo  decision,  387. 

Kepler,  Johann,  208. 

Kindergarten    idea,   424;    contribution  of, 

427;  in  U.S.,  425-26;  origin  of,  424;  spread 

of,  426. 
King's  College  (Columbia),  390. 
Knight,  the,  89. 
Knox,  John,  178. 

Lakanal,  his  law,  283. 
Lancaster,  Joseph,  339. 
Lancastrian  system,  in  England,  339-41? 
in  U.S.,  342, 360. 


IV 


INDEX 


Land  grants  for  education,  in  U.S.,  356. 
La  Salle,  educational  work  of,  183-84;  234, 

413- 
Latin  grammar  schools,  in  England,  147-48; 
in  New  England,  193, 386;  in  Middle  Ages, 

85- 
Law,  canon,  103. 

Law,  evolution  of,  as  a  study,  101-03. 
Legislative  Assembly,  France,  280. 
Leonard  and  Gertrude,  297. 
Lepelletier  le  Saint-Fargeau,  283. 
Libraries,  early  monastic,  74;  university,  119. 
License  to  teach,  first,  93. 
Lily's  Latin  Grammar,  147,  281. 
Lister  and  antiseptics,  405. 
Literature,  in  ancient  Greek  education,  11. 
Living  conditions,  transformation  of,  in  19th 

century,  407. 
Locke,  John,  217,  230-32. 
Lombard  League,  the,  102.  " 

Loyola,  Ignatius,  179. 
Ludi  magister,  the,  33,  34. 
Luther,  Martin,  156;  his  Theses,  157;  his 

educational  ideas,  166-67. 
Lutheran  school  organization,  166-70. 
Lycdes,  creation  of,  under  Law  of  1802, 326, 

333- 
Lyceum,  the,  23. 
Lyell,  Charles,  405. 

Macaulay,  Lord,  347. 

Madison,  James,  288. 

Magellan,  139. 

Mann,  Horace,  on  Prussian  Teachers'  Sem- 
inaries, 317;  work  in  establishing  normal 
schools,  417;  work  in  Massachusetts,  379- 
80,  382,  388. 

Manual  activities  in  education,  427-30;  con-  < 
tribution  of,  429;  origin  of  instruction  in, 
427;  spread  of  the  idea  of,  428. 

Manual-labor  school  idea,  302. 

Manufacturing,  rise  of,  265. 

Manuscripts,  copying  of,  74. 

Maria  Theresa,  256. 

Massachusetts  Law  of  1642,  194;  Law  of 
1647,  195;  Law  of  1827,  387. 

Massachusetts  school  system,  fight  for  secu- 
lar schools,  382;  fundamental  basis  of,  196; 
State  Board  of  Education  created,  379. 

Maurus,  R.,  86. 

Mediaeval  Church,  repressive  attitude  of,  92. 

Mediaeval  education,  characteristics  of,  91- 
94. 

Mediaeval  man,  transformation  of,  130, 

Mediaevalism,  reaction  against,  149. 

Medical  inspection  in  schools,  452. 

Medical  instruction,  beginnings  of,  103. 

Medicean  Library,  135. 

Medici,  Cosimo  de,  135. 

Melancthon,  145. 

Mercator's  map  of  the  world,  210. 


Methods  of  teaching,  evolution  of  new,  418. 
Middle  Agee,  deadly  sins  of,  92;  problems 
faced  by,  69;  what  started  with,  55. 

Migrations  of  peoples,  to  U.S.,  443. 

Mill,  John  Stuart,  345, 

Milton,  John,  214. 

Minnesingers,  rise  of,  99,  130. 

Mirabeau,  Count  de,  279. 

Mohammedans  in  Spain,  96-99;  influence 
of,  on  Europe,  98. 

Monasteries,  civilizing  work  of,  68 ;  in  Charle- 
magne's day,  75;  preserve  learning,  71-76. 

Monastic  collections,  132. 

Monastic  schools,  54,  83,  85. 

Monasticism,  rise  of,  54. 

Monitorial  system,  in  England,  338-42;  in 
U.S.,  360. 

Montaigne,  216. 

Monte  Cassino,  54,  104. 

Montesquieu,  260. 

Music,  in  ancient  Greece,  12;  in  Seven  Lib- 
eral Arts,  86. 

Napoleon  and  technical  education,  327;  or- 
ganizing work  of,  in  France,  325-28. 

National  Convention  of  France,  282;  work 
of,  282-84. 

Nationality,  rise  of  spirit  of,  254;  schools  to 
promote,  442. 

Nations,  educational  problems  of  the  future 
of,  458-60. 

Nestorian  Christians,  96. 

New  England,  beginning  of  schools  in,  193. 

New  England  Primer,  201,  286. 

New  Jersey,  elimination  of  charity  school 
in,  375- 

Newspapers,  first,  264, 

Newton,  Sir  Isaac,  208,  226,  261. 

New  York,  attempt  to  divide  the  school 
funds  in,  383;  early  educational  history 
in,  198;  elimination  of  rate  bill  in,  377, 
first  State  Superintendent,  378. 

New  Zealand,  education  in,  399. 

Nicene  Creed,  51. 

Nobility,  training  of,  in  early  Middle  Ages, 
87-91. 

Normal  school,  contribution  of  Pestalozzi  to 
work  of,  299,  414;  in  Prussia,  302.  316, 
317;  in  U.S.,  416-19. 

Northmen,  invasions  of,  80. 

Nunneries,  76. 

Oberschulecollegium    Board    created,    313; 

abolished,  315. 
Odyssey,  translation  of,  into  Latin,  32. 
Orbis  Piclus,  223. 
Orphans,  care  of,  242. 
Owen,  Robert,  343. 

Pagan  learning,  rejection  of,  in  West,  Sl» 
Page,  a.  88. 


INDEX 


Palace  School  of  Charlemagne,  78. 

Palaestra,  in  ancient  Greece,  13, 34. 

Papal  schism,  the,  155. 

Paper,  invention  of,  136. 

Parish  school  of  early  Middle  Ages,  84. 

Pasteur,  Louis,  405. 

Pauper  school  idea,  in  England,  336;  in  U.S., 
373-76. 

Peabody,  Elizabeth,  426. 

Pedagogy.  See  Education. 

Pennsylvania,  early  educational  history  of, 
198;  settlement  of,  189. 

Pennsylvania,  Law  of  1834, 374. 

Percyvall,  John,  148. 

Peru,  education  in,  400. 

Pestalozzi,  and  Basedow  compared,  304-05; 
and  Froebel,  424;  contribution  of,  299;  to 
teacher-training  problem,  414-16;  Prussia 
sends  teachers  to  study  work  of,  302,  316; 
spread  of  ideas  of,  301;  work  of,  297-302. 

Petrarch,  131, 132, 142. 

Philadelphia,  educational  beginnings  in,  199, 
359- 

Pktlanthropinum  of  Basedow,  295. 

Philippines,  education  in,  442. 

Pilgrimages,  in  Middle  Ages,  105, 

Pilgrim's  Progress,  265. 

Plato,  23. 

Political  influences  modify  school,  440-46. 

Poor -Law  legislation  in  England,  446. 

Porto  Rico,  education  in,  442. 

Ptolemy's  Almagest,  98. 

Precenter,  the,  93. 

Presbyterians,  Scotch,  159,  178. 

Press,  freedom  of,  264. 

Primer,  the  New  England,  235,  286. 

Primer,  the  religious,  235. 

Prindpia  Regulative,  the,  309. 

Printing,  invention  of,  136. 

Private  adventure  schools,  238-42,  336. 

Probejahr,  the,  319. 

Protestant  revolts,  results  of,  157, 164. 

Protestant  school  organization,  168. 

Prussia,  benevolent  rulers  of,  254;  earliest 
school  laws  for,  309-13 ;  earliest  Teachers' 
Seminaries  in,  317  f.;  humiliation  of,  314; 
regeneration  of,  314-22. 

Prussian  school  system,  19th-century  char- 
acteristics evolved,  321;  modern  purpose 
of,  322. 

Psychology,  becomes  the  master  science, 
418. 

Public  meetings,  first  in  England,  264. 

Public  School  Society  of  N.Y.,  358. 

Punishments,  school,  244. 

Puritans,  the,  160,  191,  264. 

Quadrivium,  the,  86. 
Quintilian,  35,  133. 

Quintilian's  Institutes  of  Oratory,  recovered, 
133, 143- 


Rabelais,  Fr.,  214. 

Ragged  Schools,  338. 

Raikes,  Robert,  337. 

Rate  bill,  elimination  of,  in  U.S.,  376-78. 

Ratke,  Wolfgang,  219. 

Reading,  in  ancient  Greece,  11. 

Realism  in  education,  213-226. 

Reformation,  the  Protestant,  153-62;  and 
education,  184-87. 

Reform  Bill,  of  1832  in  England,  346, 441;  of 
1867  in  England,  347,  441. 

Rein,  William,  422. 

Religions  in  the  Roman  world,  44. 

Religious  freedom,  160,  169,  269. 

Religious  societies  for  education  in  England, 
240-42,  336-38. 

Religious  theory  for  schools,  232, 312;  weak- 
ening of,  233,  266,  284. 

Revival  of  learning,  129-39,  205;  signifi- 
cance of,  142,  153. 

Revolution  in  France,  results  of,  272. 

Revolutionary  War  in  U.S.,  effect  of,  on  edu- 
cation, 354. 

Rhetoric,  in  Seven  Liberal  Arts,  86;  law 
separates  from,  103;  schools  of,  at  Rome, 
36. 

Rhode  Island,  Barnard  in,  380-81. 

Robinson  Crusoe,  265. 

RoUand,  277. 

Roman  cities,  fate  of,  loi ;  survival  of  law  in, 
102. 

Roman  education,  schools  die  out,  51;  uni- 
versity in,  36. 

Roman  law,  influence  of,  38,  102 . 

Rome,  barbarian  inroads  on,  63;  debt  to, 
40;  education  and  work  of,  28-43;  great 
"'  mission  of,  29,  38-41. 

Rousseau,  Jean  Jacques,  232,  260,  276,  291- 
--94. 

Russia,  benevolent  despots  of,  258;  work  of 
Catherine  II,  258. 

St.  Paul's  School,  147. 
Salerno,  rise  of  medical  study  at,  104. 
Sanitary  science,  creation  of,  405. 
Saxe-Gotha,  Duke  Ernest's  work  in,  168, 

315. 

Schism,  the  papal,  155. 

Scholastic  theology,  rise  of,  99-101. 

Scholasticus,  53, 93. 

School  conditions  by  1750,  232-250. 

School  societies,  in  England,  240-42, 336-38; 
in  U.S.,  358, 359. 

School  support,  beginnings  of,  246. 

Science,  loss  and  recovery  of,  210;  in  indus- 
try, 405,  406;  in  medicine,  405;  in  schools, 
430-31;  in  university,  405. 

Scientific  knowledge,  advance  of,  in  19th 
century,  404;  applications  of,  405. 

Scientific  method,  beginnings  oi,  207-10. 

Scotland,  early  education  in,  178;  later,  396. 


VI 


INDEX 


Sectarian    instruction,    elimination    of,    in 

France,  353;  in  U.S.,  381-84. 
Sense  realism  in  education,  218-24. 
Seven  Liberal  Arts,  in  Middle  Ages,  86;  in 

Rome,  36. 
Seven  Perfections  of  Chivalry,  90. 
Siam,  education  in,  403. 
Silesian  School  Code  of  1765,  312. 
S.P.C.K.,  240,  336. 
S.P.G.,  336. 
Social  realism,  216-18. 
Sociological  influences  in  education,  434-37. 
Socrates,  22. 
Song  schools,  84. 
Sophists,  the,  20. 

Spain,  18th-century  benevolent  rulers,  257. 
Sparta,  education  in,  7-8. 
Spellers,  early,  236. 
Spencer,  Herbert,  431-33. 
Squire,  a,  89. 

State  Board  of  Education,  first,  379. 
State  control  idea,  beginnings  of,  247,  275; 

general  acceptance  of,  403;  spread  of,  395- 

404. 
State  school  superintendent,  first,  378. 
State  school  systems,  as  now  organized,  445. 
State  supervision  of  schools,  establishment 

in  the  U.S.,  378-84. 
State  theory  of  education,  general  accept- 
ance of,  403. 
State  universities  in  U.S.,  beginnings,  391; 

effect  of  Dartmouth  College  decision  on, 

391- 
States  General  in  France,  271. 
Studium  generale,  evolution  of,  113, 118. 
Sturm,  Johann,  146. 
Suffrage,  extension  of,  in  England,  346, 347, 

441;  in  U.S.,  365;  educational  significance 

of  extension  of,  366,  441. 
Sunday  Schools,  in  England,  337;  in  U.S., 

357- 
Superior  children,  education  of,  451. 
Sweden,  manual  instruction  in,  428. 
Sydenham,  Thomas,  210. 

Talleyrand,  280,  282. 

Taxation  for  education,  beginnings  of,  in 
U.S.,  370. 

Teacher  training,  beginnings  of,  413;  con- 
tributions of  Pestalozzi  to,  414-16;  the 
first  normal  schools,  413-18. 

Teachers'  certificates,  first,  93. 

Teachers,  character  of,  in  i8th  century,  238, 
242. 

Teachers'  Seminaries  in  Germany,  317. 

Teaching  methods  by  i8th  century,  243. 

Tetzel  and  indulgences,  156. 

Textbooks  by  the  i8th  century,  234. 

Theology,  rise  of  study  of,  99-101. 

Thirty  Years'  War,  the,  160, 186. 


Tournaments,  87. 

Trade  and  commerce,  revival  of,  106. 

Trent,  Council  of,  161,  179. 

Trivium,  the,  86,  116. 

Troubadours,  rise  of,  99,  130. 

Truce  of  God,  88,  99. 

Turgot,  260,  278. 

Twelve  Tables,  the,  30, 31. 

United  States,  awakening  an  educational 

.  consciousness  in,  353-68;  battles  for 
schools,  and  alignments  of  people,  367-70; 
beginnings  of  State  universities,  391;  of 
teacher  training,  417;  early  colleges  in, 
356;  effect  of  Revolutionary  War  on  edu- 
cation, 354. 

Universities,  evolution  of,  114;  faculties  in, 
117;  instruction  in,  118;  in  the  U  S.,  State, 
391 ;  of  ancient  Greek  world,  24, 36;  pub- 
lic force,  a,  122. 

University  expansion,  recent,  444. 

University  of  Alexandria,  25. 

University  of  Athens,  23. 

University  of  Berlin,  319. 

University  of  France,  327. 

Uprising  of  Prussia  of  1813,  31S,  318. 

Urbino.  Ducal  library  at,  136. 

Vatican  Library  founded,  136. 

Vernacular  schools,  introduction  of  sdence 

instruction  into,  225;  rise  of,  165, 225, 229. 
Vespasiano,  135. 
Virchow,  405. 

Virginia,  early  educational  history,  199. 
Vittarino  da  Feltre,  143. 
Volksschule,  German,  318,  321. 
Voltaire,  260,  261 . 
Voluntary  educational  system  in  England, 

335-44;  work  of,  in  establishing  scluxds. 

342. 

Waldenseemiiller,  his  Geography,  138. 

Washington,  George,  287;  his  vdll,  356. 

Watt,  James,  266. 

Wesley,  John,  337. 

Westphalia,  Peace  of,  160,  225,  834. 

Whitbread,  345. 

White  man's  burden,  the,  of  future,  458-61. 

Winchester  School  founded,  148. 

Writing  schools,  238. 

Wiirtemberg,  plan  of  ISS9. 167. 

Yale  College,  founding  of,  196. 
York,  cathedral  school  at,  76. 
Yverdon,  299,  416. 

Zeller,  Carl  August,  316. 
Zeno,  the  Stoic,  23. 
Ziller,  Tuiskon,  422. 
Zwingli,  Huldreich,  158. 


^  RIVERSIDE 

TEXTBOOKS    IN    EDUCATION 

General  Educational  Theory 

PSYCHOLOGY  FOR  NORMAL  SCHOOLS. 

By  L.  A.  AvERiLL,  Massachusetts  State  Normal  School,  Worcester. 
EXPERIMENTAL  EDUCATION. 

By  F.  N.  Fkesman,  University  of  Chicago. 
HOW  CHILDREN  LEARN.    By  F.  N.  Freeman. 

THE  PSYCHOLOGY  OFTHE  COMMON  BRANCHES.  By  F.  N.  Frbbban. 
THE  PRESCHOOL  CHILD. 

By  Arnold  Gesbll,  Ph.D.,  M.D.,  Director  Yale  Psycho-Clinic,  Professor  of 
Child  Hygiene,  Vale  University. 

DISCIPLINE  AS  A  SCHOOL  PROBLEM. 
By  A.  C.  Perrv,  Jr. 

AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  EDUCATIONAL  SOCIOLOGY. 

By  W.  R.  Smith,  Kansas  State  Normal  School. 

TRAINING  FOR  EFFECTIVE  STUDY. 

By  F.  W.  Thomas,  State  Normal  School,  Fresno,  California. 
AN  INTRODUCTION  TO  CHILD  PSYCHOLOGY. 

By  C.  W.  Waddle,  Ph.D.,  Los  Angeles  State  Normal  SchooL 

History  of  Education 

THE  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION.    By  E.  P.  Cubbbklev. 
A  BRIEF  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION.    By  E.  P.  Cubberlby. 
READINGS  IN  THE  HISTORY  OF  EDUCATION.    By  E.  P.  Cubbbrlev. 
PUBLIC  EDUCATION  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES.     By  E.  P.  Cubberlby. 

Administration  and  Supervision  of  Schools 

HEALTHFUL  SCHOOLS:  HOW  TO  BUILD,  EQUIP,  AND  MAINTAIN 
THEM. 

By  May  Ayres,  J.  F.  Williams,  M.D.,  University  of  Cincinnati,  and  T.  D. 
Wood,  A.M.,  M.D.,  Teachers  College,  Columbia  University. 

THE  PRINCIPAL  AND  HIS  SCHOOL.    By  E.  P.  Cubbbrlry. 
PUBLIC  SCHOOL  ADMINISTRATION.    By  E.  P.  Cubberlby. 
RURAL  LIFE  AND  EDUCATION.     By  E.  P.  Cubberlby. 
A  GUIDE  TO  EDUCATIONAL  MEASUREMENTS. 

By  Harlan  C.  Hinbs,  Assistant  Professor  of  Education,  The  University  ot 

Washington. 

HEALTH  WORK  IN  THE  SCHOOLS. 
By  E.  B.  Hoag,  M.D.,  and  L.  M.Tbrman,  Leland  Stanford  Junior  University. 

INTRODUCTION  TO  THE  THEORY  OF  EDUCATIONAL  MEASURE- 
MENTS. 
By  W.  S.  Monroe,  University  of  Illinois. 

MEASURING  THE  RESULTS  OF  TEACHING. 
By,W.  S.  Monroe. 

1926  a 


EDUCATIONAL  TESTS  AND  MEASUREMENTS. 
By  W.  S.  MoNROB,  J.  C.  DbVoss,  Kansas  State  Normal  School;  and  F.  J. 
Kblly,  University  of  Kansas. 

THE  SUPERVISION  OF  INSTRUCTION. 
By  H.  W.  NuTT,  University  of  Kansas. 

STATISTICAL  METHODS  APPLIED  TO  EDUCATION. 

By  H.  O.  RuGG,  University  of  Chicago. 

CLASSROOM  ORGANIZATION  AND  CONTROL. 

By  J.  B.  Sears,  Leland  Stanford  Junior  University. 

A  HANDBOOK  FOR  RURAL  SCHOOL  OFFICERS. 

By  N.  D.  Showalter,  Washington  State  Normal  School. 

THE  HYGIENE  OF  THE  SCHOOL  CHILD. 

By  L.  M.  Tbrman. 

THE  MEASUR.'-MENT  OF  INTELLIGENCE. 
By  L.  M.  Tbrmav. 

Test  Material   for  the  Measurement  of  Intelligence.     Record  Booklets  for  the 
Measurement  of  Intelligence. 

THE  INTELLIGENCE  OF  SCHOOL  CHILDREN. 
By  L.  M.  Terman. 

Methods  of  Teaching 

TEACHING  LITERATURE  IN  THE  GRAMMAR  GRADES  AND  HIGH 
SCHOOL. 
By  Emma  M.  Bolxnius. 

HOW  TO  TEACH  THE  FUNDAMENTAL  SUBJECTS. 
By  C.  N.  Kendall  and  G.  A.  Mirick. 

HOW  TO  TEACH  THE  SPECIAL  SUBJECTS. 
By  C  N.  Kendall  and  G.  A.  Mirick. 

SILENT  AND  ORAL  READING. 
By  C  B.  Stonb. 

THE  TEACHING  OF  SCIENCE  IN  THE  ELEMENTARY  SCHOOL. 
By  G.  H.  Trafton,  State  Normal  School,  Mankato,  Minnesota. 

TEACHING  IN  RURAL  SCHOOLS. 
By  T.  J.  WooFTKR,  University  of  Georgia. 

Secondary  Education 

THE  JUNIOR  HIGH  SCHOOL. 

By  Thos.  H.  Briggs,  Columbia  University. 

THE  TEACHING  OF  ENGLISH  IN  THE  SECONDARY  SCHOOL 

By  Charles  Swain  Thomas. 

PRINCIPLES  OF  SECONDARY  EDUCATION. 
By  Alexander  Inglis,  Harvard  University. 

PROBLEMS  OF  SECONDARY  EDUCATION. 
By  David  Snbddbn,  Columbia  University. 

HOUGHTON  MIFFLIN  COMPANY 

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